The Pali Text Society's Pali-English dictionary - Tuninst.net

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4- How TO Judge the Dictionary.
(a) I have already given a fairly exhaustive list of abbreviations. To these might be added a good
many more if we were writing a dictionary for inexperienced people. The less explanations necessary
in a dictionary, the better: it should explain itself; and if there are any little things not intelligible at
first, they will become so with gradual use. A dictionary is like a friend with whom you have to get
thoroughly acquainted before you come to know his peculiarities.
A dictionary can be too explicit : it will then lose its charm and become tedious. It must contain
a certain amount of hints, instead of ready solutions; the more it arouses the cm^osity (and sometimes
the anger !) of its user, the better it is for the latter. The main purpose of the dictionary is to explain;
it is a means of education as well as of information. To this category belong the (sometimes objected
to) grammatical and etymological hints. I am fully aware that they are incomplete and sometimes
perhaps problematic, but that does not matter so much in a provisional dictionary. It does our students
good to get a little etjmiology thrown in once in a while. It makes them interested in the psychology
of language, and teaches them the wide range of sound changes, besides making them aware of their
study as a thing that has been alive and through a process of werden. We are still at a stage of Pali
philology, where we can hardly get enough of that kind of thing.
(6) The following are a few additional explanations concerning the use of the Dictionary.—In the
Jataka quotations I have not distinguished between the text and the commentary (J and JA). That is
rather a pity; but it was my colleague's wish. We might also have kept the index figures of lines, as it
is sometimes very difficult to find a word in the small-print C. portions of the J. books. — Difficult
forms, although belonging to some one verb in question, I have given separately, as a help for the
student.—The Causatives have undergone a mixed treatment: sometimes they are given xmder
the simple verb, especially when their form was not very different, sometimes separately, when their form
was unusual.—The problem of the derivation of Pali words is not cleared yet. We have interchanged
between the Pali and the Sanskrit derivations.—An asterisk with Sanskrit words (*Sk.) means that the
word is late and found only in technical literature, i. e. either gram.-lexic. (like Amarako^a), or pro-
fessional (like Su^ruta).—For convenience' sake we have identified the guttiural n with the dental n.
The cerebral 1 follows upon 1.—P.D. refers to Pali Dictionary.
(c) Many of the Dictionary's faults are to be excused by the fact that its composition covers a number
of years, and that printing was going on all the time (a great drawback for the unity of the work !), so that
changes could not be made in earher parts, which were found advisable later. Here belong: i. Roots
and compounds cropped up which are not foreseen in the beginning. — 2. Cross-references are not
always exact. — 3. There exists a certain inaccuracy in the relation between words beginning with ava"
and 0°. At first these were treated jointly, but later separated. — 4. Several mistakes were found in
Rhys Davids' excerpts later and are, like others which I have corrected (see e. g. veyyavacca), to be
explained by lack of material, or by Rhys Davids being misled through Childers. — 5. Many explanations
are only tentative. I would change them now, but refrain from discussing them in the "Addenda,"
since too many of these confuse rather than enlighten the student. To these belong e.g. nibbedha and
vipancita (which ought to be viyanjita).— 6. It could hardly be avoided that, in the course of the
work, a problem has presented itself with different solutions at different times, so that discrepancies have
arisen with one and the same word. These cases, however, are rare.
{d) Now, after all this, what is the Dictionary, and what does it claim to be ? First of all, it is meant
Words only found in native vocabularies (the Abhp
to be a dictionary of Classical and Literary Pali .
e. g.) are left out, as they are only Pah adaptations of Sanskrit words (mostly lexicographical : sannakaddu=sannakadru,
Am.K. only). Nor are we concerned with Inscriptions. Thus it is intended as
a general stock-taking of the Pali Canon, and a revision of all former suggestions of translations. It
is essentially a working basis for further study and improvement. The main object has been to bring
as much material as possible to serve future \work, and this in a clear and attractive form. Many words
remain doubtful. We have given them with Buddhaghosa's interpretation, which may be right and
which may be wrong. There are some words of which we shall never know the exact meaning, just as it is
difficult even in modern times to know the exact meaning of, say, an English or German dialect word.'
' other specific terms iwith a " doctrinal " import are best left untranslated, since we are unable to translate them
adequately with our Western Christian terminology. See remarks under sankhara and cp. Mrs. Rhys Davids in K.S,
III., preface p. v.