Editing Swastika (section)

==Etymology and nomenclature==

[[File:Snoldelevsunwheel.jpg|thumb|Drawing of a swastika on the [[Snoldelev Stone]] found in [[Ramsø]], [[Denmark]] (9th century)]]
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| quote = With well-being ('''swasti''') we would follow along our path, like the Sun and the Moon. May we meet up with one who gives in return, who does not smite (harm), with one who knows.
| source = — The [[Rigveda]] V.52.15<ref>{{cite book | last1=Jamison | first1=S.W. | last2=Brereton | first2=J.P. | title=The Rigveda: 3-Volume Set | publisher=Oxford University Press | series=South Asia Research | year=2014 | isbn=978-0-19-972078-1 | url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fgzVAwAAQBAJ&pg=PA727 | access-date=2023-10-14 | page=727}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | title=ऋग्वेदः सूक्तं ५.५१ | website=विकिस्रोतः | url=https://sa.m.wikisource.org/wiki/%E0%A4%8B%E0%A4%97%E0%A5%8D%E0%A4%B5%E0%A5%87%E0%A4%A6%E0%A4%83_%E0%A4%B8%E0%A5%82%E0%A4%95%E0%A5%8D%E0%A4%A4%E0%A4%82_%E0%A5%AB.%E0%A5%AB%E0%A5%A7 | language=sa | access-date=2023-10-14}}</ref>
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The word ''swastika'' is derived from the Sanskrit root {{lang|sa-Latn|swasti}}, which is composed of {{lang|sa-Latn|su}} 'good, well' and {{lang|sa-Latn|asti}} 'is; it is; there is'.<ref name="Schliemann347" /> The word {{lang|sa-Latn|swasti}} occurs frequently in the [[Vedas]] as well as in classical literature, meaning 'health, luck, success, prosperity', and it was commonly used as a greeting.<ref name="M-W" /><ref>[https://archive.org/stream/vedicconcordance00bloouoft#page/1053/mode/1up A Vedic Concordance], Maurice Bloomfield, Harvard University Press, pp. 1052–1054</ref> The final {{lang|sa-Latn|ka}} is a common suffix that could have multiple meanings.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Page:Sanskrit_Grammar_by_Whitney_p1.djvu/494|title=Page:Sanskrit Grammar by Whitney p1.djvu/494 – Wikisource, the free online library|website=en.wikisource.org|access-date=2019-06-10}}</ref>

According to [[Monier-Williams]], a majority of scholars consider the swastika to originally be a [[solar symbol]].<ref name="M-W" /> The sign implies well-being, something fortunate, lucky, or auspicious.<ref name="M-W" /><ref>{{cite book |last1=Zimmer |first1=Heinrich |title=Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization |date=2017 |publisher=Princeton University Press}}</ref> It is alternatively spelled in contemporary texts as ''svastika'',<ref>{{cite book |first1=F. R. |last1=Allchin |first2=George |last2=Erdosy |title=The Archaeology of Early Historic South Asia: The Emergence of Cities and States |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=Q5kI02_zW70C&pg=PA180 |date=1995 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0-521-37695-2 |page=180}}</ref> and other spellings were occasionally used in the 19th and early 20th century, such as ''suastika''.<ref>First recorded 1871 ([[OED]]); alternative historical English spellings include ''suastika'', ''swastica'', and ''svastica''; see, for example: {{cite book |title=Notes and Queries|issue= 170|date= 31 March 1883 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=C2AEAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA259 |publisher=Oxford University Press |page=259}}</ref> It was derived from the [[Sanskrit]] term ([[Devanagari]] {{lang|sa|[[wikt:स्वस्तिक|स्वस्तिक]]}}), which transliterates to ''{{IAST|svastika}}'' under the commonly used [[International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration|IAST transliteration system]], but is pronounced closer to ''swastika'' when letters are used with their English values.

The earliest known use of the word swastika is in [[Pāṇini]]'s [[Aṣṭādhyāyī]], which uses it to explain one of the Sanskrit grammar rules, in the context of a type of identifying mark on a cow's ear.<ref name="Schliemann347" /> Most scholarship suggests that Pāṇini lived in or before the 4th century BCE,<ref>{{cite journal |first=Frits |last=Staal |author-link=Frits Staal |date=April 1965 |title=Euclid and Pāṇini |journal=Philosophy East and West |volume=15 |issue=2 |pages=99–116|jstor=1397332 |doi=10.2307/1397332 |issn=0031-8221 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |date=1998 |title=Pāṇini: A Survey of Research |last=Cardona |first=George |author-link=George Cardona |publisher=Motilal Banarsidass |isbn=978-81-208-1494-3 |page=268 |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=adWXhQ-yHQUC&pg=PA268 |via=Google Books}}</ref> possibly in 6th or 5th century BCE.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |url= https://www.britannica.com/topic/Ashtadhyayi |title=Panini (Indian Grammarian) |date=2013 |encyclopedia=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |first=Hartmut |last=Scharfe |title=Grammatical Literature |url= https://books.google.com/books?id=2_VbnWkZ-SYC&pg=PA88 |date=1977 |publisher=Otto Harrassowitz Verlag |isbn=978-3-447-01706-0 |pages=88–89 |via=Google Books}}</ref>

An important early use of the word ''swastika'' in a European text was in 1871 with the publications of [[Heinrich Schliemann]], who discovered more than 1,800 ancient samples of swastika symbols and variants thereof while digging the [[Hisarlik]] mound near the Aegean Sea coast for the history of Troy. Schliemann linked his findings to the Sanskrit {{lang|sa-Latn|swastika}}.<ref name="boissoneaultsm" /><ref>{{cite web |first=Douglas |last=Harper |date=2016 |url= http://www.etymonline.com/index.php?allowed_in_frame=0&search=swastika |title=Swastika |work=Etymology Dictionary}}</ref>{{sfnp|Mees|2008|pp=57–58}}

By the 19th century, the term ''swastika'' was adopted into the English lexicon,<ref>{{cite encyclopedia |title=Oxford English Dictionary |entry=Swastika |date=1933 |entry-url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.120833/page/n1120/mode/1up |page=290 |volume=X. Sole{{ndash}}Sz |publisher=Oxford University Press}}</ref> replacing the previous ''gammadion'' from Greek {{lang|grc|γαμμάδιον}}. In 1878, Irish scholar [[Charles Graves (bishop)|Charles Graves]] used ''swastika'' as the common English name for the symbol, after defining it as equivalent to the French term {{lang|fr|croix gammée}}{{snd}}a cross with arms shaped like the Greek letter [[gamma]] (Γ).<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AHcTAAAAYAAJ |title=On the Croix Gammée, or Swastika |last=Graves |first=Charles |author-link=Charles Graves (bishop) |date=April 1879 |journal=The Transactions of the Royal Irish Academy |volume=27 |pages=41–46 |publisher=[[Royal Irish Academy]]}} Read by Graves to the Royal Irish Academy on 13 May 1878.</ref> Shortly thereafter, British antiquarians [[Edward Thomas (antiquarian)|Edward Thomas]] and [[Robert Sewell (historian)|Robert Sewell]] separately published their studies about the symbol, using ''swastika'' as the common English term.<ref>{{cite journal |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-UIOAAAAQAAJ |title=The Indian Swastika and Its Western Counterparts |first=Edward |last=Thomas |author-link=Edward Thomas (antiquarian) |date=1880 |publisher=[[Royal Numismatic Society]] |journal=Numismatic Chronicle |volume=20 |pages=18–48}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=TRYHAAAAQAAJ |title=Notes on the Swastika |first=Robert |last=Sewell |author-link=Robert Sewell (historian) |date=1881 |journal=[[The Indian Antiquary]] |volume=9 |pages=65–73}}</ref>

The concept of a "reversed" swastika was probably first made among European scholars by [[Eugène Burnouf]] in 1852 and taken up by [[Heinrich Schliemann|Schliemann]] in ''Ilios'' (1880), based on a letter from [[Max Müller]] that quotes Burnouf. The term {{lang|sa-Latn|sauwastika}} is used in the sense of 'backward swastika' by [[Eugène Goblet d'Alviella]] (1894): "In India it [the ''gammadion''] bears the name of {{lang|sa-Latn|swastika}}, when its arms are bent towards the right, and {{lang|sa-Latn|sauwastika}} when they are turned in the other direction."<ref>[http://sacred-texts.com/sym/mosy/mosy06.htm#page_40 ''The Migration of Symbols''] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210225075221/https://sacred-texts.com/sym/mosy/mosy06.htm#page_40 |date=25 February 2021 }}, by [[Eugène Goblet d'Alviella]], (1894), p. 40 at [[sacred-texts.com]]</ref>

Other names for the symbol include:
* {{lang|grc-Latn|tetragammadion}} (Greek: {{lang|grc|τετραγαμμάδιον}}) or ''cross gammadion'' ({{langx|la|crux gammata}}; French: {{lang|fro|croix gammée}}), as each arm resembles the Greek letter Γ ({{lang|grc-Latn|[[gamma]]}})<ref name="MigSym" />
* ''hooked cross'' (German: {{lang|de|Hakenkreuz}}), ''angled cross'' ({{lang|de|Winkelkreuz}}), or ''crooked cross'' ({{lang|de|Krummkreuz}})
* ''cross cramponned'', ''cramponnée'', or ''cramponny'' in heraldry, as each arm resembles a [[Crampon (heraldry)|crampon]] or angle-iron ({{langx|de|link=no|Winkelmaßkreuz}})
* ''[[fylfot]]'', chiefly in heraldry and architecture
* {{lang|grc-Latn|tetraskelion}} (Greek: {{lang|grc|τετρασκέλιον}}), literally meaning 'four-legged', especially when composed of four conjoined legs (compare [[triskelion]]/triskele [Greek: {{lang|grc|τρισκέλιον}}])<ref>{{cite web |url= https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/tetraskelion |title=tetraskelion |work=Merriam-Webster Dictionary |edition=Online |publisher=Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. |access-date=9 February 2019}}</ref>
* {{lang|lv|[[ugunskrusts]]}} (Latvian for 'fire cross, cross of fire"; other names{{snd}} {{lang|lv|pērkonkrusts}} ('cross of thunder', 'thunder cross'), cross of [[Perun]] or of [[Perkūnas]]), cross of branches, cross of [[Laima]])
* ''whirling logs'' (Navajo): can denote abundance, prosperity, healing, and luck<ref>{{cite web |url=http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2013/08/07/melissa-codys-whirling-logs-dont-you-dare-call-them-swastikas-150782 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20130811070916/http://indiancountrytodaymedianetwork.com/2013/08/07/melissa-codys-whirling-logs-dont-you-dare-call-them-swastikas-150782 |archive-date=11 August 2013 |title=Melissa Cody's Whirling Logs: Don't You Dare Call Them Swastikas |date=7 August 2013 |work=Indian Country Today Media Network}}</ref>

In various European languages, it is known as the ''[[fylfot]]'', {{lang|grc-Latn|gammadion}}, {{lang|grc-Latn|tetraskelion}}, or {{lang|fro|cross cramponnée}} (a term in Anglo-Norman [[heraldry]]); German: {{lang|de|Hakenkreuz}}; French: {{lang|fr|croix gammée}}; Italian: {{lang|it|croce uncinata}}; [[Latvian Language|Latvian]]: {{lang|lv|[[ugunskrusts]]}}. In [[Mongolian Language|Mongolian]] it is called {{lang|mn-Cyrl|хас}} ({{lang|mn-Latn|khas}}) and mainly used in seals. In Chinese it is called 卍字 ({{lang|cmn-Latn|wànzì}}), pronounced {{lang|ja-Latn|manji}} in Japanese, {{lang|ko-Latn|manja}} (만자) in Korean and {{lang|vi|vạn tự}} or {{lang|vi|chữ vạn}} in [[Vietnamese language|Vietnamese]]. In [[Baltistan|Balti]]/[[Tibetic languages|Tibetan]] language it is called {{lang|bft-Latn|yung drung}}.{{citation needed|date=January 2023}}