lion - "five-faced"

George Hart ghart at SOCRATES.BERKELEY.EDU
Wed Jan 15 17:43:41 UTC 2003


To add to Jean-Luc Chevillard's note, the Tamil Lexicon gives
aivaaymaan (5-mouth-animal) as lion and suggests it is a "wrong
translation of panca into five, in the word pancaanana, or
broad-faced, a term for lion."  It also says aivaaymirukam means
"Indian black bear, melursus ursinus, so called from the prehensile
power of his four feet and mouth."  Apte does not give "bear" as one
of the meanings of pancaanana (or, to exactly parallel the Tamil
word, pancaananamrga).  Unfortunately, the Lexicon does not give a
source for the meaning "bear."





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