The Oxford English Dictionary also records namaste used as a verb, meaning “to give a namaste (to).”Ī related word, namazlik, meaning “prayer rug,” was entered in Merriam-Webster’s 1934 Unabridged edition, Webster’s Second. The old man made his usual namaskar-the Indian greeting of folded hands.īut namaskar didn’t stick in English, and instead today there is much evidence for the two-word phrases namaste pose, namaste gesture, and namaste posture. Others similarly gloss the word’s meaning in context: Other languages: Bulgarian Chinese Czech. One by one they filed past, some doing namaskar (hands placed together in an attitude of prayer), others bowing low and touching the ground with their foreheads. Popular: English to Chinese, English to French and Chinese to English. Learn more in the Cambridge Spanish-English Dictionary. : a respectful Indian mode of address or salutation performed by joining the palms, inclining the head, and saying “namaskar”Īmong the citations for this word is a report of Gandhi’s funeral: mas translations: but, more, other, more, most, plus, addition, more, more, most, else, further, more, more, more. Our files show that a related word, namaskar, was considered for entry during work on the revision of our Unabridged Dictionary in the 1950s. Adwani, (letter) The Times of India (New Delhi, India), 31 Mar.
“Goodbye and good luck,” he called.Įarly use of the term in English can be found in English-language Indian press:īy the bye, Sir, is it too much to say that it is high time Indian members accosted each other with a dignified salaam or a hearty namaste or exchanged compliments with each other in Hindi? On the ramp’s top, he turned and clasped hands in a farewell namasthe. This traditional Hindu namasthe (greeting) is as much a part of his public manner as was the V sign for Churchill. In response Nehru closed his palms in front of his chest. Its initial use for a broad American readership, unsurprisingly, was associated with stories about the newly independent India and its leader: It had been transliterated as na-mas-tay, namasthe, and namaste until the latter became standard in the mid-20th century. The Sanskrit phrase namaste is formed from namaḥ, meaning “bow, obeisance, adoration,” and the enclitic pronoun te, meaning “to you.” The noun namaḥ, in turn, is a derivative of the verb namati, which means “(she or he) bends, bows.”įor such an old word, it came to English fairly recently. Many Americans first encountered the word 'namaste' when reading about the newly independent India during the mid-20th century.
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