रन्ध्र

From Proto-Indo-Aryan *rándʰram, from Proto-Indo-Iranian *rándʰram, from Proto-Indo-European *lóndʰ-rom, from *lendʰ- (“loins”). Cognate with Latin lumbus, Russian ля́двея (ljádveja), Old English lenden (whence English lend). Since the semantic shift from “loins” to “fissure” seems unlikely compared to the reverse, it is possible that Sanskrit preserves the original sense of the word as “fissure”, which was lost in the other branches; thus the unattested verbal sense of the root may have been *“to split apart” or similar.

An alternative etymology compares Old English rendan (“to rend, tear, cut, lacerate, cut down”) (modern English rend) and Albanian k-rënd (“cut-up leaves; tinder”), which would point to PIE *(H)rendʰ- (“to cut, split apart, tear”), but the modern consensus on rend and its Germanic cognates is that they are related to Proto-Germanic *hrindaną (“to push”), in which the initial *h (< PIE *k or *ḱ) precludes the possibility of relationship with रन्ध्र (rándhra). (Can this⁽⁺⁾ etymology be sourced?)

• (Vedic) IPA^(key): /ɾɐ́n.dʱɾɐ/
• (Classical Sanskrit) IPA^(key): /ˈɾɐn̪.d̪ʱɾɐ/

रन्ध्र • (rándhra) stem, n

1. a slit, split, opening, aperture, hole, chasm, fissure, cavity
2. the vulva
3. a defect, fault, flaw, imperfection

• रन्ध्रान्वेषण (randhrānveṣaṇa)
• ब्रह्मरन्ध्र (brahmarandhra, “an aperture in the crown of the head”)

• → Bengali: রন্ধ্র (rondhro)
• → Hindi: रंध्र (randhra)
• Pali: randha
• → Tamil: ரந்திரம் (rantiram)
• → Telugu: రంధ్రము (randhramu)

• Monier Williams (1899) “रन्ध्र”, in A Sanskrit–English Dictionary, , new edition, Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, →OCLC, page 0866.