Tibetan Grammar - Connective Case

WORK IN PROGRESS: the grammar articles are being edited for wiki publication. During editing, the content might be incomplete, out of sequence or even misleading. In the verb section the approach to explain Tibetan verbs is changed to that of the "three thematic relations: Theme, Location, and Agent" - there will be discrepancies to the other grammar section until they are matched with it

Articles on Tibetan Grammar

1. Introduction

2. Formation of the Tibetan Syllable

3. Formation of the Tibetan Word

4. First case: ming tsam

5. agentive particle

6. Connective Particle

7. La don particles

8. La don particles—Notes

9. Originative case

10. Verbs

11. Verbs—Notes

12. Syntactic particles

by Stefan J. Eckel

Connective Case—འབྲེལ་བའི་སྒྲ་: གི་ཀྱི་གྱི་འི་ཡི་

• Also called: connective particle; relation particle; genitive particle
  

The connective cases connects nouns and noun phrases with other nouns, noun phrases and adjectives. Of the two connected parts it is the second that is "said more about", that is qualified, modified etc. by the first part. E.g. དམ་པའི་ཆོས་ with དམ་པ་ "noble" coming first and being joined by the connective particle འི་ to ཆོས་ "Dharma" identifying it to be the "noble Dharma". The usage of the connective case is always independent of the clause's verb, it does not mark the function of any of the participants of the clause in relation to the verb. The connective case is also used to coordinate clauses. In this usage it needs to come after the root of the verb.

The categories below are for illustration of the types of connections that occur with the connective case and are not exhaustive as such. Some of these categories can be further expanded while others can be merged. Some examples might belong to more than one category or, on the other hand, some might not fit neatly into any of them, e.g.

བདག་ཅག་གི་སྟོན་པ་

we        teacher

our teacher

བདག་ཅག་གི་སྟོན་པ་ "our teacher" might be classed with "possessive connective", yet as it is an epithet of the Buddha himself it does not seem quite fitting when thinking of the Tibetan term for the "possessive connective" which is described by བདག་པོ་ "owner". The usual "quick fix" would be to place it with "modification" and does not cause any trouble with the English meaning of the term, but with the Tibetan explanation for "modification"-connective being the connection of the ཁྱད་ཆོས་ "feature, quality" and the bases for these features ཁྱད་གཞི་ it again does not seem to be quite fitting. It might also be placed in "field of activity connective" or in a new extra category of "metaphorical field of activity connective". One solution would be to introduce a category like "simple connections" or "miscellaneous connections" to include all those connections that seem not to fit otherwise. Since that would not add anything new to support the understanding of the different type of connections expressed by the connective case, this is not done here.

Connecting Nouns and Pronouns With Nouns

Possessive Connective

• Also called: ownership, possession
• Tibetan grammatical term: བདག་པོ་དང་དངོས་པོའི་འབྲེལ་བ་
  

བདག་གི་གོས་

I clothes

my clothes

ངའི་ལག་པ་

I hand}

my hand

སུའི་ཁང་པ།

who house

Whose house?

Modification

• Also called: type connective, relation of modifier and modified
  
• Tibetan grammatical terms: ཁྱད་ཆོས་དང་ཁྱད་ཆོས་ཅན་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་, ཁྱད་གཞི་དང་ཁྱད་ཆོས་ཀྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་
  

གསེར་གྱི་ཁ་དོག་

gold colour

golden colour, colour of gold

Relation of Location

Relation of Location and Inhabitants

• Tibetan grammatical term: གནས་གཞི་དང་གནས་ཆོས་ཀྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

cause and result

Relation of Cause and Result

• Tibetan grammatical term: རྒྱུ་འབྲས་ཀྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Relation of Origination, Causal Relation

• Tibetan grammatical term: དེ་འབྱུང་འབྲེལ་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Relation of the Source / Origin and the Originated

• Tibetan grammatical term: འབྱུང་ཁུངས་དང་འབྱུང་ཁུངས་ཅན་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Apprehended Object and That Which Apprehends

• Tibetan grammatical term: ཡུལ་དང་ཡུལ་ཅན་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Composition

Relation of Part and Whole

• Tibetan grammatical term: ཡན་ལག་དང་ཡན་ལག་ཅན་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Relation of Essence and That What Is Of That Essence

• Tibetan grammatical term: རང་བཞིན་དང་རང་བཞིན་ཅན་གྱི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Adjectives, Verbal Adjectives

Adjectives are in their "simplest" usage placed after the noun, e.g. རི་དཀར་པོ་ "white mountain". They can be placed before nouns by using the connective particle between the adjective and the noun.

Verbal Adjective

The verb that becomes the verbal adjective is always nominalized. This is like (6 connecting phrases and clauses with nouns or noun-phrases) a noun qualified by an adjectival clause, with the "clause" in this case only consisting of the verb.

Apposition

Apposition - Relation of Same Identity / Essence

• Tibetan grammatical term: གཞི་ཆོས་ངོ་བོ་གཅིག་པའི་འབྲེལ་བ་

Postpositions and Postpositional Forms

Postpositions come with the connective case before them, joining them to the word they follow.

As the great scholar and pioneer of Tibetan, Alexander Csoma de Körös wrote : "The compound postpositions require, in general, the genitive case [here: connective case] before them. But sometimes the genitive signs being dropped, they are put after the nominative [here: ming tsam], like the simple postpositions [here: case-marking particles]."1Alexander Csoma de Koros, 1834, A grammar of the Tibetan Language, p. 101 §187

Connecting Phrases and Clauses with Nouns or Noun-Phrases

• Note: Most of the upcoming examples in this section are generic.