The article discusses the meaning of Sanskrit mahāsattva as a name or epithet for the Bodhisattva in early non-Mahāyāna Sanskrit texts. It is aimed to show that the texts discussed here presuppose an understanding of the term as a bahuvrīhi compound meaning ‘of great courage,’ as opposed to an interpretation as a karmadhāraya compound ‘a great being’ that is frequently adopted in modern translations of Buddhist Sanskrit texts.