ꦧꦶꦱ

Javanese

Etymology

• Inherited from Old Javanese bisa (“powerful, mighty; skilled, accomplished, capable”), probably from Sanskrit. Doublet of ꦧꦶꦱ (bisa) and ꦮꦶꦱ (wisa).
  • Sanskrit विष (viṣa, “poison”).
  • Sanskrit विशारद (viśārada, “clever, skilful, or proficient”), from विश (viśa) or बिस (bisa, “the fibres of the stalk of a lotus”).
  • Sanskrit विश् (viś, “working man, peasant”). Compare to Sanskrit वैश्य (vaiśya, “peasant, Vaishya”).
• Inherited from Old Javanese byasa, bhyāsa, abhyāsa (“to be practised in, to occupy os. constantly with; to be familiar with, acquainted with, at home in”), from Sanskrit अभ्यास (abhyāsa, “drill; habit”).

According to Blust and Trussel, the word comes from the same Sanskrit विष (viṣa, “poison”) and is very widespread in the Philippines and both western and eastern Indonesia, acquiring a variety of secondary meanings including that of general force or power, skill, knowledge and ability. In Malay and some other languages (e.g. Rembong), this abstraction and generalization of the original concrete nominal sense has gone even further, leading to the use of bisa as an auxiliary verb meaning 'can, be able'.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): (Standard Mataram) /bi.sɔ/, (Serang) /bi.sə/
• Rhymes: -sɔ
• Hyphenation: bi‧sa

Verb

ꦧꦶꦱ (bisa)

1. (ngoko) can, able

   Synonym: (krama) ꦱꦒꦼꦢ꧀ (saged)

Alternative forms

• ꦲꦶꦱ (isa)

Descendants

• → Indonesian: bisa, sabi (slang)
  • → Malay: bisa

Further reading

• The Linguistic Center of Yogyakarta (2015) “bisa”, in Kamus Basa Jawa (Bausastra Jawa) [Javanese Language Dictionary (Javanese Dictionary)] (in Javanese), Yogyakarta: Kanisius, →ISBN