Classical Tibetan

Short description: Form of Tibetan language, 10th – 12th centuries, CE

Classical Tibetan

Region| Tibet, North Nepal
Era| 11th–19th centuries

Language family

Sino-Tibetan

* Tibeto-Kanauri ?
* Bodish
* Tibetic
* Classical Tibetan

Early form

Old Tibetan

Writing system

| Tibetan script
Language codes
ISO 639-3| `xct`

Linguist List

| `xct`
Glottolog| `clas1254`[1]

Classical Tibetan refers to the language of any text written in Tibetic after the Old Tibetan period. Though it extends from the 12th century until the modern day,[2] it particularly refers to the language of early canonical texts translated from other languages, especially Sanskrit. The phonology implied by Classical Tibetan orthography is very similar to the phonology of Old Tibetan, but the grammar varies greatly depending on period and geographic origin of the author. Such variation is an under-researched topic.[citation needed]

In 816 AD, during the reign of King Sadnalegs, literary Tibetan underwent a thorough reform aimed at standardizing the language and vocabulary of the translations being made from Sanskrit, which was one of the main influences for literary standards in what is now called Classical Tibetan.[3]

## Contents

* 1 Nouns
* 1.1 Structure of the noun phrase
* 1.2 Cases
* 1.3 Pronouns
* 1.3.1 Personal pronouns
* 2 Verbs
* 2.1 Inflection
* 2.2 Negation
* 2.3 Honorifics
* 3 See also
* 4 References
* 5 Further reading
* 6 External links

## Nouns

### Structure of the noun phrase

Nominalizing suffixes — Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. or Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. — are required by the noun or adjective that is to be singled out;

* Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. or Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (masculine) and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (feminine) are used for distinction of gender.

The plural is denoted, when required, by adding the morpheme Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.; when the collective nature of the plurality is stressed the morpheme Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. is instead used. These two morphemes combine readily (e.g. Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'a group with several members', and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'several groups').[4]

### Cases

The classical written language has ten cases.[5]

* absolutive (unmarked morphologically)
* genitive (-གི་ -gi, -གྱི་ -gyi, -ཀྱི་ -kyi, -འི་ -'i, -ཡི་ -yi)
* agentive (-གིས་ -gis, གྱིས་ -gyis, -ཀྱིས་ -kyis, -ས་ -s, -ཡིས་ -yis)
* locative (-ན་ -na)
* allative (-ལ་ -la)
* terminative (-རུ་ -ru, -སུ་ -su, -ཏུ་ -tu, -དུ་ -du, -ར་ -r)
* comitative (-དང་ -dang)
* ablative (-ནས་ -nas)
* elative (-ལས་ -las)
* comparative (-བས་ -bas)

Case markers are affixed to entire noun phrases, not to individual words (i.e. Gruppenflexion).

Traditional Tibetan grammarians do not distinguish case markers in this manner, but rather distribute these case morphemes (excluding -dang and -bas) into the eight cases of Sanskrit.

### Pronouns

There are personal, demonstrative, interrogative and reflexive pronouns, as well as an indefinite article, which is plainly related to the numeral for "one."[6]

#### Personal pronouns

As an example of the pronominal system of classical Tibetan, the Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., exhibits the following personal pronouns.[7]

Person | Singular | Plural

|
|

First person | ང་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | ངེད་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
First + Second |  | རང་རེ་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
Second person | ཁྱོད་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | ཁྱེད་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
Third person | ཁོ་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | ཁོང་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.

Like in French, the plural (ཁྱེད་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.) can be used as a polite singular.[7]

## Verbs

Verbs do not inflect for person or number. Morphologically there are up to four separate stem forms, which the Tibetan grammarians, influenced by Sanskrit grammatical terminology, call the "present" (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.), "past" (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.), "future" (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.), and "imperative" (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.), although the precise semantics of these stems is still controversial. The so-called future stem is not a true future, but conveys the sense of necessity or obligation.

The majority of Tibetan verbs fall into one of two categories, those that express implicitly or explicitly the involvement of an agent, marked in a sentence by the instrumental particle (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., etc.) and those that express an action that does not involve an agent. Tibetan grammarians refer to these categories as Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. respectively. Although these two categories often seem to overlap with the English[citation needed] grammatical concepts of transitive and intransitive, most modern writers on Tibetan grammar have adopted the terms "voluntary" and "involuntary", based on native Tibetan descriptions.[citation needed] Most involuntary verbs lack an imperative stem.

### Inflection

Many verbs exhibit stem ablaut among the four stem forms, thus Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. or Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. in the present tends to become Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. in the imperative Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. ('to do'), an Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. in the present changes to Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. in the past and future (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'to take'); in some verbs a present in Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. changes to Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. in the other stems (Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist., Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'to take'). Additionally, the stems of verbs are also distinguished by the addition of various prefixes and suffixes, thus Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (present), Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (past), Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (future), 'Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. (imperative). Though the final Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. suffix, when used, is quite regular for the past and imperative, the specific prefixes to be used with any given verb are less predictable; while there is a clear pattern of Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. for a past stem and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. for a future stem, this usage is not consistent.[8]

Meaning | present | past | future | imperative

|
|
|
|

do | བྱེད་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བྱས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བྱ་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བྱོས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
take | ལེན་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བླངས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བླང་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | ལོངས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
take | འཛིན་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བཟུངས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | གཟུང་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | ཟུངས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.
accomplish | སྒྲུབ་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བསྒྲུབས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | བསྒྲུབ་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. | སྒྲུབས་ Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.

Only a limited number of verbs are capable of four changes; some cannot assume more than three, some two, and many only one. This relative deficiency is made up by the addition of auxiliaries or suffixes both in the classical language and in the modern dialects.[9]

### Negation

Verbs are negated by two prepositional particles: Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. and Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.. Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. is used with present and future stems. The particle Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. is used with the past stem; prohibitions do not employ the imperative stem, rather the present stem is negated with Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.. There is also a negative stative verb Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'there is not, there does not exist', the counterpart to the stative verb Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'there is, there exists'.

### Honorifics

As with nouns, Tibetan also has a complex system of honorific and polite verbal forms. Thus, many verbs for everyday actions have a completely different form to express the superior status, whether actual or out of courtesy, of the agent of the action, thus Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'see', hon. Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.; Script error: The function "transl" does not exist. 'do', hon. Script error: The function "transl" does not exist.. Where a specific honorific verb stem does not exist, the same effect is brought about by compounding a standard verbal stem with an appropriate general honorific stem such as Script error: The function "transl" does not exist..

## See also

* Standard Tibetan

## References

1. ↑ Hammarström, Harald; Forkel, Robert; Haspelmath, Martin, eds (2017). "Classical Tibetan". Glottolog 3.0. Jena, Germany: Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History. http://glottolog.org/resource/languoid/id/clas1254.
2. ↑ Tournadre 2003, p. 27.
3. ↑ Hodge 1993, p. vii.
4. ↑ Hahn 2003.
5. ↑ Hill 2012.
6. ↑ Waddell & de Lacouperie 1911, p. 919.
7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 Hill 2007.
8. ↑ Hill 2010.
9. ↑ Waddell & de_Lacouperie 1911, p. 920.

## Further reading

* Bialek, Joanna (2022), A Textbook in Classical Tibetan, London: Routledge, ISBN 9781032123561, https://www.routledge.com/A-Textbook-in-Classical-Tibetan/Bialek/p/book/9781032123561
* Beyer, Stephen (1992). The Classical Tibetan language. New York: State University of New York. Reprint 1993, (Bibliotheca Indo-Buddhica series, 116.) Delhi: Sri Satguru.
* Hahn, Michael (2003). Schlüssel zum Lehrbuch der klassischen tibetischen Schriftsprache. Marburg: Indica et Tibetica Verlag.
* Hill, Nathan W. (2007). "Personalpronomina in der Lebensbeschreibung des Mi la ras pa, Kapitel III". Zentralasiatische Studien 36: 277–287. http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/5609/.
* Hill, Nathan W. (2010), "Brief overview of Tibetan Verb Morphology", Lexicon of Tibetan Verb Stems as Reported by the Grammatical Tradition, Studia Tibetica, Munich: Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaften, pp. xv–xxii, http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/11006/3/Hill_2010_verb_dictionary_excerpt.pdf
* Hill, Nathan W. (2012). "Tibetan -las, -nas, and -bas.". Cahiers de Linguistique Asie Orientale 41 (1): 3–38. doi:10.1163/1960602812X00014. http://eprints.soas.ac.uk/14122/.
* Hodge, Stephen (1993). An Introduction to Classical Tibetan (Revised ed.). Warminster: Aris & Phillips. pp. vii. ISBN 0856685488.
* Schwieger, Peter (2006). Handbuch zur Grammatik der klassischen tibetischen Schriftsprache. Halle: International Institute for Tibetan and Buddhist Studies.
* Tournadre, Nicolas (2003). Manual of Standard Tibetan (MST). Ithaca, NY: Snow Lion Publications.
* skal-bzhang 'gur-med (1992). Le clair miroir : enseignement de la grammaire Tibetaine. Paris: Editions Prajna.

## External links

* Tibetan in Digital Communication
* Translations of Tibetan texts, Tibetan language courses & publications by Erick Tsiknopoulos and the Trikāya Translation Committee.

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