Hindupedia, the Hindu Encyclopedia - User contributions [en]

Veda

2010-01-05T06:34:24Z

N. Siva Senani: Inserted link to vyakarana

{{Author|Shankara Bharadwaj Khandavalli}}

Veda is the highest authority in [[Hindu]] knowledge system and the authority of all other scriptures are based on the authority of the Veda. [[Vedas]] are four - Rig, Yajur, Sama and Atharva. [[Rigveda]] contains prayers to Gods (Riks are the mantras). [[Yajurveda]] has methods to use Riks for sacrifices (Yajus-[[Yajna]]). Sama Veda introduces musical notes. Atharva Veda gives ways to make life successful, and contains methods to fulfill what can be called material aspirations.

Each Veda has three sections - Samhita, Brahmana and Aranyaka. Samhita has prayers or Suktas. Brahmana has sacrificial methods. Aranyaka has Mantras and methods that are practiced in the forests (that is, not for grhasthas). Upanishads normally appear in the last part of Aranyaka and deal with spiritual philosophy. Some Upanishads are exceptions and appear in Samhita and Brahmana too. Thus [[Upanishad]], as it appears in the last part of the Veda, is called [[Vedanta]]. There are 108 Upanishads and 10 of them are famous. Since Upanishads mostly philosophical they are found in prose. But there are Upanishads like Taittireeya and [[Ganapathi Atharva seersha]] that have svara.

These four sections are mapped to the four Ashramas. A brahmacari is supposed to study the Samhita. Grhastha is supposed to follow the Brahmana. Vanaprasthi is supposed to follow Aranyaka. Sanyasi is supposed to contemplate on the Upanishads.

The [[Rigveda]] itself indicates that Truth is one - "ekam sad vipra bahudha vadanti agnim yamam matariswanam ahuh"<ref>Rigveda Samhita 1.164.46</ref> (meaning Truth is one, but the learned refer to it in different names like agni, yama, matariswan). But the concept that there is a single Parabrahman and that all Gods are Its forms, is more clearly visible towards the [[Vedanta]] (Upanishads). Its implications can be seen in later sections, especially when we discuss Darshanas and Puranas.

Veda literally means knowledge. Traditionally the following features are attributed to the Veda:
# Veda is anantha (infinite). Only an infinitesimal portion of it is revealed to humans. This can be understood in the sense that knowledge is infinite. However, Veda is the knowledge of Brahman, the True, Absolute and the Infinite. And the essence of Veda is said to be understood if one knows the infinite, i.e., opens up to the infinite Self. Realizing the infinite through any single [[mantra]]/sukta of the Veda is equivalent to understanding the essence of any other mantra and the entire Veda. Thus it is said know the One (Brahman) by which everything else is known.
# Veda is anadi, having no beginning or end. It said to exist eternally; it is called the breath of Paramatma. This is a poetic expression, this does not literally mean paramatma has a breath but just the way breath exists with a person's life similarly veda exists with God/creation. While the modern view is that Rigveda is the oldest, it is only in compilation that it is possibly older. Rigveda itself mentions [[Yajurveda]] and Samaveda. For instance Purusha sukta (RV 10.90) says "Tasmaat yagnaat sarva hutaH, RucaH-samaani jagnire, chandaagmsi jagnire tasmaat, yajus tasmaadajaayata".
# Veda is apourusheya, not authored by humans. The seers are said to reveal veda mantras to the world, they are called drastas. Rigveda says "catvari vak parimita padani tani vidur brahmana ye minishinah, guha trini nihita neengayanti turiyam vaco manushya vadanti"<ref>Rigveda Samhita 1.164.45</ref>, meaning vak exists in four forms and the learned know of them. Three are hidden and the fourth is what men speak. Vak (literally word, but meaning veda [[mantra]] here) is said to exist in four forms - para, pasyanti, [[madhyama]] and vaikhari. Para is the eternal form of vak. Pasyanti is when a seer envisions the mantra. Madhyama is when it descends into mind plane. Vaikhari is the expression. Thus the Veda mantras exist eternally, they are only revealed to the world by the seers.

Though there are four [[Vedas]], there are alternate recitations in each Veda. These are called "pathantaram"s. Based on these, various branches exist in each Veda, each of them is called a Veda sakha.

There are various methods of chanting the Veda, like ghana and jata.

==Rigveda==
{{Main|Rigveda}}
The mantras in Rigveda are called Riks. Rigveda has 10 mandalas, 1028 suktas and 10170 riks in the whole. Each sukta is a collection of riks on a [[devata]] and each mandala has many suktas. The samhita portion of Rigveda contains suktas alone and all suktas are addressed to devatas like Agni, [[Vayu]], [[Vishnu]], Rudra, Mitra, Varuna, Pushan, Aryaman.

The major Upanishads found in Rigveda sakhas are Aitareya and Kaushitaki.

==Yajurveda==
{{Main|Yajurveda}}
As the name suggests, Yajurveda deals with [[Yajna]], sacrifice. It applies riks and gives procedures and mantras for sacrifices.

There are two major sakhas in the Yajurveda, Sukla and [[Krishna]]. Krishna Yajurveda sakha is also called Taittireeya sakha. Samhita of Sukla Yajurveda is called Vajasaneya samhita and that of Krishna Yajurveda is called Taittireeya samhita. Brahmana of Sukla Yajurveda is called the Satapatha brahmana. In the Krishna Yajurveda, there is an overlap between samhita and brahmana portions and lays down the procedures for sacrifices. This can be understood in the light of the fact that brahmana is the sacrificial code and Yajurveda combines this with riks. Many sacrifices like Darsapurnamasa, Vajapeya, Somayaga, and Aswamedha are found in Yajurveda.

There is a special place for lord Rudra in the Krishna Yajurveda, and Rudra suktam is found in the middle of Taittireeya Samhita. It has 7 kandas and the fourth kanda has 9 chapters. Namakam is the 5th chapter and while [[Chamakam]] 7th chapter of the fourth kanda. This is because Rudra is the presiding deity of Yajnas and Yajurveda deals with Yajnas.

The major Upanishads found in Yajurveda are Brihadaranyaka, Maitri, Isa, Taittiriya, Svetasvatara and Katha.

==Samaveda==
{{Main|Samaveda}}
Samaveda puts the riks in musical notes. The musical notes in samaveda are said to be the origin of traditional musical octet.

Major Upanishads found in Samaveda are Kena and Chandogya.

==[[Atharvaveda]]==
{{Main|Atharvaveda}}
[[Atharvaveda]], apart from hymns to gods, gives many ways to make life successful. While Gayatri mantra is said to be the essence of the three Vedas (Rig, Yajur and Sama), there is a different Gayatri mantra for Atharvaveda. And it requires that a second Upanayana is done for the pupil before he is initiated to learning Atharvaveda. (Another brahmopadesam of Atharva Gayatri is done here).

Atharvaveda contains prayers to Gods not mentioned in the other three Vedas, like Pratyangira. Atharvaveda also uses many Riks. For instance, the Manyu sukta of Rigveda appears as two chapters "sena nireekshana" and "sena samyojana" in the Atharvaveda.

Major Upanishads in Atharvaveda are Mandukya, Mundaka and Prasna.

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Related Articles==
* Origin & Evolution of the Veda
* Veda as History
* Veda - Textual Classifications & Categories
* The [[Vedangas]]
** Shiksha - Phonetics & Phonology
** Chhandas - Meter
** [[Vyakarana]] - Grammar
** Nirukta - Etymology
** Jyotisa - [[Astronomy]] & [[Astrology]]
** [[Kalpa]] - Ritual
* [[Upavedas]]
** [[Ayurveda]] (Medicinal System)
** Dhanurveda (Archery)
** Gandharvaveda ([[Music]], [[Dance]])
** [[Sthapatyaveda]] (Architecture)

Talk:Sanskrit Grammar

2010-01-03T06:24:46Z

N. Siva Senani: Put some introductory text in the article; hyperlink to "Introduction to Grammar" to be provided

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural and functional relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita.

The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is explained in the article, "Introduction to Grammar". Here the contents of grammar are explained in brief with the beginner in focus.

==Ground rules==

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

==Sandhi==

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

==Declensions==

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below. This verse is found in the Ramaraksha Stotra composed by Sage Budha Kausika[http://www.hindupedia.com/en/Sri_Rama_Raksha_Stotram]:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

==Indeclinables==

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

==Formation of Feminine Bases==

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

==Cases (kārakas)==

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

==Compound words==

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

==Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives==

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

==Conjugation of Roots==

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

===The Six Tenses===

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

===The Four Moods===

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. In English and Classical langauges of the West, the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive, as used in the Vedic language, is slightly different. It is a composite mood, and may be considered to have six tenses (as per S. C. Vasu): Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional and Strong Imperfect Conditional. It conveys (according to the sūtra 3.4.8 of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī) the senses of 'upasaṁvāda (contingent promise or reciprocal agreement as in 'If you do X, I will give you Y') and āśankā (apprehension, guess, estimate).

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

===Alternative Names for Moods===

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

==Derivative Verbs==

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

==Kridantas or Krit affixes==

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

==Uṇādi Sutras==

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

==Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents==

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

==Liṅgānuśāsanam==

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

Talk:Vyakarana

2010-01-03T06:09:37Z

N. Siva Senani: /* Contents of Grammar */ Reference to the other article provided; hyperlink to be provided.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-30T09:38:24Z

N. Siva Senani:

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

The word, Vyākaraṇa, is formed by prefixing 'vi' and 'ā' to the root 'kri', to do. The first prefix suggests division, differentiation, distinguishing etc.; the sense of the second prefix is to put together, gather, to include etc. Thus, Vyākaraṇa may be thought of as an analysis of language to identify the basic building blocks of language and a synthesis of those building blocks. More formally, Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural and functional <ref> Thanks to Sri Vinay Jha, vinayjhaa@gmail.com for pointing out that both structural and functional relationships are covered by Grammar in the Indian tradition </ref> relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax <ref> Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar] </ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudī was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī.

==The Siddhāntakaumudī ==

The Siddhāntakaumudī, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudī, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudī with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudī called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudī, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudī includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudī, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below. This verse is found in the Ramaraksha Stotra composed by Sage Budha Kausika[http://www.hindupedia.com/en/Sri_Rama_Raksha_Stotram]:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. In English and Classical langauges of the West, the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive, as used in the Vedic language, is slightly different. It is a composite mood, and may be considered to have six tenses (as per S. C. Vasu): Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional and Strong Imperfect Conditional. It conveys (according to the sūtra 3.4.8 of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī) the senses of 'upasaṁvāda (contingent promise or reciprocal agreement as in 'If you do X, I will give you Y') and āśankā (apprehension, guess, estimate).

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudī incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudī, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudī and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-30T09:32:07Z

N. Siva Senani: Added 'functional relationships' to definition of grammar, and analysed the word vyakarana briefly

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

The word, Vyākaraṇa, is formed by prefixing 'vi' and 'ā' to the root 'kri', to do. The first prefix suggests division, differentiation, distinguishing etc.; the sense of the second prefix is to put together, gather, to include etc. Thus, Vyākaraṇa may be thought of as an analysis of language to identify the basic building blocks of language and a synthesis of those building blocks. More formally, Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural and functional <ref>Thanks to Sri Vinay Jha, vinayjhaa@gmail.com for pointing out that both structural and functional relationships are covered by Grammar in the Indian tradition<ref>relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudī was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī.

==The Siddhāntakaumudī ==

The Siddhāntakaumudī, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudī, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudī with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudī called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudī, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudī includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudī, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below. This verse is found in the Ramaraksha Stotra composed by Sage Budha Kausika[http://www.hindupedia.com/en/Sri_Rama_Raksha_Stotram]:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. In English and Classical langauges of the West, the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive, as used in the Vedic language, is slightly different. It is a composite mood, and may be considered to have six tenses (as per S. C. Vasu): Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional and Strong Imperfect Conditional. It conveys (according to the sūtra 3.4.8 of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī) the senses of 'upasaṁvāda (contingent promise or reciprocal agreement as in 'If you do X, I will give you Y') and āśankā (apprehension, guess, estimate).

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudī incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudī, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudī and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-05T09:50:26Z

N. Siva Senani: Attributed the verse starting "Ramo Rajamanih..." and linked to the same on Hindupedia

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudī was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī.

==The Siddhāntakaumudī ==

The Siddhāntakaumudī, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudī, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudī with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudī called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudī, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudī includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudī, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below. This verse is found in the Ramaraksha Stotra composed by Sage Budha Kausika[http://www.hindupedia.com/en/Sri_Rama_Raksha_Stotram]:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. In English and Classical langauges of the West, the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive, as used in the Vedic language, is slightly different. It is a composite mood, and may be considered to have six tenses (as per S. C. Vasu): Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional and Strong Imperfect Conditional. It conveys (according to the sūtra 3.4.8 of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī) the senses of 'upasaṁvāda (contingent promise or reciprocal agreement as in 'If you do X, I will give you Y') and āśankā (apprehension, guess, estimate).

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudī incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudī, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudī and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-05T09:33:13Z

N. Siva Senani: Strengthened the explanation of Subjunctive with material from Siddhantakaumudi.

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudī was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī.

==The Siddhāntakaumudī ==

The Siddhāntakaumudī, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudī, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudī with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudī called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudī, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudī includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudī, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. In English and Classical langauges of the West, the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive, as used in the Vedic language, is slightly different. It is a composite mood, and may be considered to have six tenses (as per S. C. Vasu): Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional and Strong Imperfect Conditional. It conveys (according to the sūtra 3.4.8 of the Aṣṭhādhyāyī) the senses of 'upasaṁvāda (contingent promise or reciprocal agreement as in 'If you do X, I will give you Y') and āśankā (apprehension, guess, estimate).

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudī incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudī, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudī and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-05T08:40:12Z

N. Siva Senani:

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudī contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudī is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudī was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudī.

==The Siddhāntakaumudī ==

The Siddhāntakaumudī, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudī, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudī with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudī remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudī called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudī, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudī includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudī, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudī puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudī: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudī. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudī. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudī incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudī, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudī, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudī and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-12-05T08:32:32Z

N. Siva Senani: Attributed the first verse at the beginning of the article

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||<ref> The introductory verse in the Preface written by Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri to the Mādhavīya Dhātuvritti of Sāyaṇācārya edited by him and published by Prachya Bharati Prakashan, Kamaccha, Varanasi in 1964. Swāmi Dwārikādās Śāstri does not give the source of this Ārya verse; he merely describes it as ‘abhiyuktokti’ ('a well reasoned saying', in this context) with no attribution as to who first proposed this. By Indian convention, since this has been referred to as a 'saying' (ukti), it is to be inferred that it is not his own verse.</ref>

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf Paniniya Dhatupatha], Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-27T06:15:40Z

N. Siva Senani: Changed the definition of subjunctive, removed attribution; incorporated the concept of meta-language in the conclusion.

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax<ref>Definition of Grammar, The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar]</ref>. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive requires an event contrary to the present state of affairs to take place. If we change the above cited example to “If it were to rain, he would not go”, it would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme is to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

The language in which Sanskrit grammar is composed is almost in a different class by itself. It has a number of abbreviations, very specific and narrow definitions for things such as the genitive and the locative case, and such highly evolved rules, that the language of composition is referred to as a meta-language. Modern Linguistics has borrowed such concepts from Sanskrit grammar.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-24T03:14:53Z

N. Siva Senani:

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar, adapting the definitions given in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar], is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place. Pratyāhāras are notational abbreviations formed by combining the first and last letters of the portion of text being referred to.

In addition to Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present” (Wikipedia, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood]). To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-24T03:08:23Z

N. Siva Senani: /* Alternative Names for Moods */

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar, adapting the definitions given in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar], is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present” (Wikipedia, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood]). To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
|-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|-
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* laṅ is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-24T03:07:02Z

N. Siva Senani: /* Cases (kārakas) */

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar, adapting the definitions given in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar], is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present” (Wikipedia, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood]). To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* This is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-24T03:05:52Z

N. Siva Senani: /* The Four Moods */

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar, adapting the definitions given in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar], is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present” (Wikipedia, [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood]). To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* This is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-24T03:02:55Z

N. Siva Senani: Added references to the definition of grammar and subjunctive mood; tabulated the karakas and 3rd person singular form of bhu in the ten tenses and moods, added link in references

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar, adapting the definitions given in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition, 2004 [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/grammar], is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
{| class="wikitable"
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

{| class="wikitable"
!!Karaka !!Case !!Usage !!Example
|-
||kartā ||Nominative (prathamā) ||Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb ||rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
|-
||karma ||Accusative (dvitīyā) ||Denotes the object ||rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
|-
||karaṇa ||Instrumental (tritīyā) ||Denotes the agent or instrument of action ||rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
|-
||sampradāna ||Dative (caturthī) ||Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made ||rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
|-
||apādāna ||Ablative (paṅcamī) ||The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. ||rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
|-
||adhikaraṇa ||Locative (saptamī) ||Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. ||rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.
|-
|}

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present” [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subjunctive_mood]. To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!!S. No. !!lakāra !!Descriptive Lable !!Sense conveyed !!3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
|-
||1 ||laṭ ||Present tense ||Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. ||bhavati
-
||2 ||liṭ ||Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite ||Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted ||babhūva
|-
||3 ||luṭ ||First future or Periphrastic future tenses ||Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). ||bhavitā
|-
||4 ||lṛiṭ ||Second future or simple future tense ||Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. ||bhaviṣyati
|-
||5 ||leṭ ||Subjunctive mood ||Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas. ||
|-
||6 ||loṭ ||Imperative mood ||Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. ||bhavatu, bhavatāt
|-
||7 ||laṅ * ||Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite ||Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. ||abhavat
|-
||8 ||liṅ ||vidhiliṅ Potential mood ||Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. ||bhavet
|| || ||āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood ||Blessings ||bhūyāt
|-
||9 ||luṅ ||Aorist or 3rd Preterite ||Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others ||abhūt
|-
||10 ||lṛiṅ ||Conditional mood ||Action conditional upon something ||abhaviṣyat
|-
|}
* This is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents,[http://sanskritdocuments.org/all_pdf/dhatupatha.pdf]</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma, 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-22T18:03:05Z

N. Siva Senani: Removed the reference to the first two lines of Rigveda as the picture of the manuscript was not loaded/

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

==Grammar and Scripture==

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

==Prātiśākhya ==

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

==Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar==

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

==The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

==Māheśvara Sūtras==

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅcavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

# a, i, u, ṇ |
# ṛ, ḷ, k |
# e, o, ṅ|
# ai, au, c|
# ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
# la, ṇ |
# ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
# jha, bha, ñ|
# gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
# ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
# kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
# ka, pa, y|
# śa, ṣa, sa r|
# ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

==The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

==The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī==

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

==The Siddhāntakaumudi ==

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

==Contents of Grammar==

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

===Ground rules===

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

===Sandhi===

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

===Declensions===

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

{| class="wikitable"
!akārāntaḥ!!pulliṅgaḥ!!rāma!!śabdaḥ
|-
||rāmaḥ ||rāmau ||rāmāḥ ||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmam ||rāmau ||rāmān ||dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmeṇa||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmaiḥ ||tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāya||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||caturthī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmāt ||rāmābhyāṁ||rāmebhyaḥ||pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāmasya||rāmayoḥ||rāmāṇāṁ||ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||rāme ||rāmayoḥ||rāmeṣu ||saptamī vibhaktiḥ
|-
||he rāma||he rāmau he rāmāḥ||sambodhana||prathamā vibhaktiḥ
|-
|}

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihatā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

===Indeclinables===

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are
* prepositions,
* adverbs,
* particles,
* conjunctions and
* interjections.
There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

===Formation of Feminine Bases===

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A formal study is taking up in advanced stage.

===Cases (kārakas)===

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

Karaka Case Usage Example
kartā Nominative (prathamā) Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
karma Accusative (dvitīyā) Denotes the object rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
karaṇa Instrumental (tritīyā) Denotes the agent or instrument of action rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
sampradāna Dative (caturthī) Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
apādāna Ablative (paṅcamī) The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
adhikaraṇa Locative (saptamī) Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

===Compound words===

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

===Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives===

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

===Conjugation of Roots===

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three numbers – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

====The Six Tenses====

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

====The Four Moods====

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the bit about children is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present”. To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

====Alternative Names for Moods====

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

S. No. lakāra Descriptive Lable Sense conveyed 3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
1 laṭ Present tense Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. bhavati
2 liṭ Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted babhūva
3 luṭ First future or Periphrastic future tenses Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). bhavitā
4 lṛiṭ Second future or simple future tense Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. bhaviṣyati
5 leṭ Subjunctive mood Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas.
6 loṭ Imperative mood Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. bhavatu, bhavatāt
7 laṅ * Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. abhavat
8 liṅ vidhiliṅ Potential mood Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. bhavet
āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood Blessings bhūyāt
9 luṅ Aorist or 3rd Preterite Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others abhūt
10 lṛiṅ Conditional mood Action conditional upon something abhaviṣyat

* This is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb accrues to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

===Derivative Verbs===

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

===Kridantas or Krit affixes===

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

===Uṇādi Sutras===

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

===Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents===

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

===Liṅgānuśāsanam===

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

==Gaṇapāṭha==

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

==Dhātupāṭha==

{| class="wikitable"
! !!Siddhantakaumudi<ref>Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu</ref>!!Madhaviya Dhatuvritti<ref>Madhaviya Dhatuvritti, A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900</ref>!!Paniniya Dhatupatha<ref>Paniniya Dhatupatha, Sanskrit Documents</ref>!!Ashtadhyayi<ref>Ashtadhyayi, Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma's , 1969</ref>
|-
||Class 1||1059||995||1165||1010
|-
||Class 2||72 ||71||76||72
|-
||Class 3||25 ||24||26||24
|-
||Class 4||137 ||137||161||140
|-
||Class 5||34 ||34||39||34
|-
||Class 6||143 ||153||173||157
|-
||Class 7||25 ||25||25||25
|-
||Class 8||10 ||10||10||10
|-
||Class 9||61 ||60||71||61
|-
||Class 10||395||390||489||410
|-
||||1961||1899||2235||1943
|-
|}

The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

==Difficulty in Learning==

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

==Conclusion==

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

==Notes & References==
{{reflist}}

==Further Reading==
* Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts.
* The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier-Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive.
* The site [http://www.sanskritdocuments.org Sanskrit Documents] maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet.
* [http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/ Maharshi University of Management] has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing.
* The [http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp Chitrāpūr Math] has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit on the internet.
* Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the [http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/ gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī].
* [http://www.new.dli.ernet.in The Digital Library of India] has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit.
* [http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb Samskrita Bhārati] has the most extensive program of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

Talk:Vyakarana

2009-11-22T00:57:59Z

N. Siva Senani: Introduces Sanskrit grammar and its various components

Vyākaraṇa, Grammar.

vyākaraṇāt padasiddhiḥ padasiddher arthanirṇayo bhavati |
arthāt tattvajṅānaṁ tattvajṅānāt paraṁ śreyaḥ ||

(From [knowledge of] grammar one obtains words; from words, meaning; from meaning the knowledge of Brahman; and from that, the Ultimate Bliss.)

1. Introduction

Grammar is the system of rules, implicit in a language, governing the structural relationships of the language including word components, phonology, morphology and syntax. Syntax refers to rules governing how words combine to form phrases and sentences. Morphology refers to the process by which word components – roots, stems, prefixes, affixes etc – combine to form words. Phonology, a more technical and narrower term of linguists, is the study of 'sound systems' of a language. To give an example, in English, phonology studies along with stress and intonation, why words English words are pronounced the way they are. Grammars of some languages include pronunciation, word meaning and etymology; but Indians have treated the science of pronunciation and etymology separately. A particular feature of the Indian tradition is the close relationship between religion (more a 'way of life' as viewed by the practitioners) and these sciences. The study of these is clubbed with the study of scriptures and the basic texts are considered divine in inspiration.

Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī is the text meant when one refers to the grammar of Sanskrit without any qualification. This is called Aṣṭādhyāyī because it contains eight chapters; each of these is further divided into four quarters. In total, there are 3,978 sūtras. The reference to a sūtra has three parts: ‘1.4.14’ refers to the 14th sūtra in the fourth quarter of the first chapter. This text, composed more than 2,400 years ago, remains the most comprehensive grammar of Sanskrit and is still taught and studied in a slightly re-arranged manner in India and elsewhere. It is also one of the most comprehensive grammars of any language in the world. Yet for such a comprehensive grammar, it is remarkably short, only as long as 1,000 ślokas. To give an idea of how long this is, it would fit into fifty A4 sheets, typed normally. This extreme terseness is mainly due to the nature of the sūtra-type of literature. A sūtra, usually translated as aphorism, is extremely terse – often being unintelligible – and indicates the key aspects or essence of the subject matter. For a sūtrakāra, it is famously said, half a syllable saved is as valuable as begetting a son. With such extremely terse construction, collections of sūtras are indeed short. However, the conciseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is also on account of a) the most basic or fundamental level at which the problems of grammar were considered and answered, b) the ingenuity of its structure as seen by the use of 'pratyāhāras' and the order in which the sūtras have been arranged. Each of these aspects of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is fascinating in its own right and would be treated at some length at the appropriate place.

Apart from Pāṇini's work, three other works – all related and closely dependent on the Aṣṭādhyāyī – need to be mentioned with respect to grammar. They are the vārtikas by Kātyāyana or Vararuchi, the bhāṣya by Patanjali, and the rearrangement into chapters by Bhattoji Dīkṣita in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi. An edition of the Mahabhāṣya contains the original sūtras, the vārtikas and the bhāṣya; similarly Siddhāntakaumudi contains the original sūtras, many of the vārtikas, and notes by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The aspect of rearrangement in the Siddhāntakaumudi is best explained after discussing the ordering of the sūtras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Apart from Paninian grammar, there are other grammars of Sanskrit before Pāṇini and after Pāṇini as well, and aspects of those grammars are still used in addition to the main body of the Paninian grammar. For instance, the visarga does not have the status of a character in Paninian grammar; yet, in all Indian languages, not merely Sanskrit, the anusvāra (bindu) and visarga find a place in the varṇamāla at the end of the vowels.

Sanskrit grammar is also the model/source for grammars of other Indian languages. While this author is not acquainted with any grammar other than that of Telugu, Sanskrit and English – with maybe some exposure to the grammar of Hindi – one gets a sense that other Indian languages like Bengali and Marathi borrow many bits of their grammar, in addition to the vocabulary, from Sanskrit. In Telugu, the situation is that grammatical terminology is imported wholesale from Sanskrit, though the meaning of the term is sometimes inappropriate. For instance, the infinitive is called the 'tumun-anta' in Sanskrit, as an affix called tum[un] is attached at the end of a verb-stem to form the infinitive, as in gantuṁ (to go) and paṭhituṁ (to read). The infinitive is called the tumun-anta in Telugu as well, though the affix which is actually attached is 'ku' as in povuṭaku (to go) and caduvuṭaku (to read). This is so because the meaning associated with tumun-anta as the infinitive has transcended the etymological meaning of 'ending in tumun'. If the situation is such in a language with about 2,000 years of existence and 1,000 years of high quality literature, one could well imagine how strong the influence would be on the later languages belonging to the same branch of Indo-European languages as Sanskrit. The first Tamil grammar, the Tolkappiyam, is said to be based on aindra grammar, a precursor to Paninian grammar.

Thus, we see that Sanskrit grammar is at once one of the oldest grammars, one of the tersest, one of the most comprehensive, and verily the specimen nearest to a 'perfect grammar' that humanity has.

2. Grammar and Scripture

The six aṅgas, elements in the sense of constituent parts, of the Veda are Śikṣa (phonetics), Chandas (prosody), Vyākaraṇa (grammar), Nirukta (etymology), Jyotiṣa (astronomy and astrology) and Kalpa (compendium of instructions – regarding ritual and law). These are said to be the nose, feet, mouth, ears, eyes and hand in that order, of the vedas. The vedas are to be learnt along with these six aṅgas, and further four upāṅgas – subsidiary elements – of Nyāya, Mīmāṁsa, Purāṇa and Dharmaśāstra. A person who has learnt the Veda in such a way is referred to as sa-aṅga-upāṅga-veda-vid, combined as sāṅgopāṅga-vedavid.

Thus vyākaraṇa is an integral part of the vedic studies. In fact the very first purpose of vyākaraṇa listed by the sage Kātyāyana is rakṣa – protection of the vedas. For a text which was not written for many years, the integrity of the vedas over thousands of years and across thousands of kilometres is remarkable. This was possible due to the vikriti pāṭhas of the Veda. Whereas in the prakriti pāṭha, the Veda is in proper order, in vikriti pāṭhas, the original text is arranged in various elaborate ways, as if each syllable were like the svaras, sa-re-ga-ma-pa-da-ni. For instance, while learning classical music, at an early stage one encounters what are known as janṭa svaras –

sa-sa-re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma
re-re-ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa
ga-ga-ma-ma-pa-pa-da-da
.... and so on.

Now, if instead of individual svaras, we insert syllables (or words) of a particular mantra, with various permutations and combinations, the various vikriti patterns of reciting or chanting the vedas obtain. The most famous of such vikriti pāṭhas is the ghana, a ghanapāṭhi being considered the most qualified amongst vedic pundits. As the order changes, different syllables come in contact with each other and different sandhis occur, all of which ought to be meticulously followed. Vyākaraṇa is the science which helps determine the form of the resultant syllable. A ghanapāṭhi needs to be a master of sandhi rules and apply them continuously even as he focuses on the original and rearrangement of the same. A small wonder, then, that they are considered the foremost of the vedic pundits.

The other four purposes enumerated by the sage Kātyāyana are ūha (imagination, as in a priest using the appropriate noun forms depending on whose behalf the ritual is being conducted), āgama (vedas – the correct recitation and understanding of), laghutva (conciseness) and asandeha (removal of doubts).

That grammar is not removed from ritual or religion in the Hindu society is also seen from the fact that in the Sri Chakra arcana, a few sūtras of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī are recited as the Mother is fond of all the vidyas. The very origin of grammar is attributed to Maheśvara, the sound of whose drum is said to have given rise to the fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, which are assumed to have been studied in Pāṇini's grammar. Even as the pride of place is given to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, there are separate vedic grammars called prātiśākhyas.

3. Prātiśākhya

These are grammars nominally specific to a given Śākha, branch of a Veda. For instance, the Taittirīya prātiśākhya is associated with the Taittirīya śākha of the Krishna Yajur Veda. These prātiśākhyas are somewhat limited grammars, with more focus on the phonetics; but they sometimes deal with material outside the scope of grammar and the application of some of their rules is often beyond the Vedas. For instance, the final chapter of rik-prātiśākhya deals with vedic chandas, more elaborately than Piṅgala's chandas. Sanskrit – and hence in many Indian languages, maybe excepting Tamil to a certain extent – spellings are phonetic, that is, a word is spelt exactly as written. However, three syllables seem to be exceptions to this rule: the saṁyuktākṣara, conjunct syllable, formed when 'ha' is followed by 'ma', 'na', and 'ṇa' as in Brahma, vahni, aparāhṇa. In each of these cases, it seems that the pronunciation of the syllable is reversed to result in 'Bramha', 'vanhi', and 'aparāṇha' and no rule in Aṣṭādhyāyī explains this apparent reversal. We find an answer in the Taittirīya prātiśākhya, where it is explained that the 'ha' followed by ṇa, na, and ma is nasalised, and in actual pronunciation the nasalised 'ha' sounds like the anunāsika (ṇa, na and ma) followed by ha. This is what leads to the apparent reversal, especially as the last nasal sounds are not audible.

Other rules of various prātiśākhyas prescribing non-difference amongst va and ba; ra and la; ya and ja; or doubling of certain conjuncts are followed not merely in the vedic language but in the geographies where those recensions were popular. Thus, in Bengal where Śukla Yajurveda is the most popular, to this day, the non-difference among va and ba is followed. It is believed that one should follow Śiṣṭa vyavahāra, the conduct of the distinguished. The most distinguished persons in a region are the vedic pundits, and if they interchange va and ba, the rest of the population would also do it. Thus, in this derived fashion we have the rules of prātiśākhya also governing day to day usage.

4. Pre-Paninian and Post-Paninian Grammar

Some ancient texts mention eight grammars including the Paninian, and some mention nine texts. The Ramayana describes Hanuman as the knower of nine grammars – navavyākaraṇārthavetta. According to one tradition when Brihaspati taught grammar to Indra, he set out to teach every form of every subanta and tiṅganta. Indra is supposed to have improvised upon this by separating the prakriti and pratyaya, the base and the affix. The aindra vyākaraṇa is not purely mythological (nor is the Brihaspati vyākaraṇa); some traces of it are indeed found. As mentioned earlier, the Tamil grammar Tolkappiyam is based on Indra's grammar. We have presently available, ten prātiśākhyas, all of which are some sorts of grammar, if mainly vedic. That apart, Pāṇini himself mentions ten grammarians: Āpiśāli, Kāśyapa, Gārgya, Gālava, Cākravarmaṇa, Bhāradvāja, Śākaṭāyana, Śākalya, Senaka and Sphoṭāyana. Other texts mention 15 grammarians before Pāṇini. All in all, according to Mahamahopadhyaya Sri Pullela Sriramachandrudu (in the introduction to his Telugu translation of the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi, the introduction being based on Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmaṁsaka's 'Saṁskrit vyākaraṇ kā itihās'), about 85 pre-Paninan grammarians can be identified.

Then, there are internal evidences to suggest that some of the sūtras in Aṣṭādhyāyī are actually earlier sūtras used without change by Pāṇini. A proper discussion of the internal evidence requires a good knowledge of grammar. At this point, it would suffice to say that Pāṇini's work is best thought of as a culmination of generations of effort, rather a work entirely by Pāṇini.

As it were, the development of grammar did not end with Pāṇini, though such an accusation is often hurled at Pāṇini. Most unusually in the sūtra-vritti-bhāṣya tradition, when Kātyāyana or Vararuchi wrote the vritti on the sūtrapāṭha, he corrected Pāṇini, sometimes subtly and sometimes directly; and Patanjali who wrote the Mahabhāṣya further improvised. The present form of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is usually the text finalised in the Kāśikā, written in the eighth century after Christ, though it is possible to identify most changes done by the Kāśikākāras. Glosses on commentaries, explanations of glosses and so on kept appearing up to the sixteenth century till the Siddhāntakaumudi was composed by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. Bhattoji Dīkṣita is quite orthodox and does not admit anybody other than the munitrayam – Pāṇini, Vararuchi and Patanjali – as an authority on grammar.

The Aṣṭādhyāyī, initially in its original form, and in the last four hundred years or so in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi, stands out as the brightest star. Even so, it has to be appreciated that this is a result of a continuous process of observation, theorisation, discussion and refinement that happened across vast distances in time and place and that is has been built upon, refined further and improvised mainly in its application, after its composition.

5. The Companion Books of Aṣṭādhyāyī

The Aṣṭādhyāyī is studied along with its companion books: the Māheśvara sūtras, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras, the liṅgānuśāsanam, the gaṇa pāṭha and the dhātu pāṭha.

Essentially, the Māheśvara sūtras are the characters of the alphabet arranged as 14 sūtras. These serve to generate 44 pratyāhāras, notational lables, which denote a set of syllables. These short-cuts are used through out the grammar which contributes to the terseness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Early Sanskrit etymologists, most famously Yāska (the author of Nirukta) argued that all words can be derived etymologically from the roots. The grammarians differed by qualifying that only the regularly formed words can be derived etymologically. Notwithstanding the much acclaimed comprehensiveness of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, a number of irregular words cannot be derived using only the rules of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The uṇādi sūtras serve to fill this gap and supply the affixes and rules required to derive the irregular words. Pāṇini is aware of the uṇādi sūtras, mentions them as 'too many', and does not include them in the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

The phiṭ sūtras are so named because they give rules of accents in 'phiṭ's, nominal stems. It is interesting that the nominal stem is called prātipadika according to the Paninian system. The authorship of these sūtras numbering 87, arranged in four chapters, is attributed to Śāntanavāchārya. Whereas the sūtras dealing with accent in the Aṣṭādhyāyī deal with the finally derived noun forms, the phiṭ sūtras deal with the accent in the nominal stem. Paninian rules on accent presuppose knowledge of accent in nominal bases and so the phiṭ sūtras are essential to complete the rule-system governing accents.

The liṅgānuśāsanam gives the rules of gender of words. Sanskrit has three genders and the gender of the word occasionally differs from the natural gender. A famous example is the wife, which has synonyms in all the three genders: bhāryā (feminine), kalatram (neuter) and dārā (masculine). Since Sanskrit admits technically only two kinds of words – subanta (ending in sup, case affixes) and tiṅganta (ending in tiṅ, verb-affixes pronounced as ‘ting’ rhyming with thing and wing), every non-verb is a subanta and has gender. Subanta includes seven of the eight parts of speech, as classified in English, that is, nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions and interrogatives. Additionally, it includes derived words such as participles. Many of these are indeclinables, which have the same form in the three genders and eight cases.

The gaṇapāṭha consists of groups of similar words, to which certain rules of grammar apply identically. The gaṇa or group is referred to by the starting word. The authorship of the list is disputed, but reference to this list is essential to know the full application of any given rule.

The dhātupāṭha is a list of about 2,200 primitive roots classified into ten groups and gaṇas. Each group of roots conjugate broadly similarly. Conjugation is the process by which, a root or stem transforms into a verb. For instance, khād is the root meaning 'to eat'. To this root, the tiṅ affixes are added and it forms the present tense, third person (prathama puruṣa in Sanskrit) verb of khādati (eats, eating), past tense, third person verb of akhādat (ate), future tense, third person verb of khādiṣyati (will eat) and so on. Almost all vocabulary of Sanskrit is traced to these roots and thus knowledge of the dhātupāṭha along with grammar is all that is required to master Sanskrit.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, the rearrangement of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, the uṇādi sūtras, the phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam are included. The Māheśvara sūtras are normally given before the beginning of the text. Thus of the six companion books to the Aṣṭādhyāyī, four are normally included with the main book, and the two lists – gaṇapāṭha and dhātupāṭha are like appendices.

6. Māheśvara Sūtras

nrittāvasāne naṭarājarājaḥ nanāda ḍhakkām navapaṅchavāram |
uddhartu kāmassanakādi siddhān etadvimarśe Śivasūtrajālam ||

(At the end of his dance, Naṭaraja sounded his drum nine and five times. Desirous of the upliftment of siddhas like Sanaka, I expand these Śiva sūtras).

The fourteen Māheśvara sūtras, so named because they have emanated from the drum of Lord Śiva during his Cosmic dance, are:

1. a, i, u, ṇ |
2. ṛ, ḷ, k |
3. e, o, ṅ|
4. ai, au, c|
5. ha, ya, va, ra, ṭ |
6. la, ṇ |
7. ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na m|
8. jha, bha, ñ|
9. gha, ḍha, dha ṣ|
10. ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, ś|
11. kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, v|
12. ka, pa, y|
13. śa, ṣa, sa r|
14. ha, l|

The last letter in each of the sūtras is called an 'it' (rhymes with ‘with’) and is purely indicatory, not a part of the sūtra itself. When any alphabet in the above list is combined with an 'it', a pratyāhāra is formed which indicates all the intervening letters, but not the intervening 'it's. Thus, ac indicates a, i, u, ṛ, ḷ, e, o, ai and au. In Pāṇini's system, 'a' stands for the short or hrasva 'a', the long or dīrgha 'ā', and a third yet longer form 'a3' called pluta, which is pronounced for a period of three measures, where a hrasva is pronounced for a period of one measure, and dīrgha, two measures. To complete this description, the letter also indicates the svarita, udātta and anudātta vowel 'a', as well as the nasalised and non-nasalised vowel 'a'. Thus it represents eighteen forms of 'a'. Thus, collectively, the pratyāhāra ac includes all the vowels of Sanskrit. This in fact is the etymological origin of the technical word for vowels in Sanskrit (and Hindi, Telugu etc.), ac. Similarly hal refers to ha, ya, va, ra, la, ña, ma, ṅa, ṇa, na, jha, bha, gha, ḍha, dha, ja, ba, ga, ḍa, da, kha, pha, cha, ṭha, tha, ca, ṭa, ta, ka, pa, śa, ṣa, sa and ha. In other words, hal refers to all the consonants, and is used in that sense in Indian languages. Pāṇini has used 44 pratyāhāras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī, but not others which are technically possible.

While the Māheśvara sūtras are nothing more than the letters of the alphabet, and are actually called akṣarasamāmnāya or varṇasamāmnāya, their beauty lies in their arrangement. The grouping is such that similar letters which are commonly subject to certain rules are grouped together. However this grouping itself is dynamic; while all consonants behave similarly in case of certain sandhis, the semi-vowels ya, ra, la, va behave differently from the rest of the consonants for another sandhi. All such groupings are made possible with this arrangement. In short, by the very grouping, all the possible permutations and combinations of similarities amongst the letters of the alphabet are encoded. All this, with but a single repetition of one letter! One wonders at the ingenuity of the arrangement and can readily appreciate why the origin of such an arrangement is considered divine.

7. The Types of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī

The sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī are classified under six heads: sanjñā, paribhāṣā, vidhi, niyama, atideśa and adhikāra. Some add a seventh head, niṣedha.

The most common rule is the vidhi, operational rule. These describe the normal processes of grammar. For instance, 6.1.101 (akaḥ savarṇe dīrghaḥ) states that the vowels a, i, u, ṛ and ḷ lengthen when followed by a similar (savarṇa) vowel.

A sanjñā sūtra is a definition which introduces new technical words. Fox example, 1.4.14 (suptiṅantam padam) defines a word as something ending in either a sup or tiṅ, both of which are technical words referring to case-affixes and verb-affixes. The names 'sup' and 'tiṅ' are themselves formed by combining the first syllable of the case-affixes with the last 'it' of the last case-affix and by combining the first syllable of the verb-affixes with the last 'it' of the verb-affixes. We observe that this convention is exactly similar to the way pratyāhāras formed using the Māheśvara sūtras.

Rules which establish such conventions are called paribhāṣa rules, or metarules, or rules of interpretation. 1.1.46 (ṣaṣṭhī sthāneyogā) gives the rule of interpretation when a word is used in the genitive case, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti. Normally, ṣaṣṭhī vibhakti is used to convey the sense of possession, as in rāmasya bāṇam, rāmabāṇam (Rama's arrow), relation in place, comparison, nearness, proximity, change, collection, component member and others. The present sūtra clarifies that in the sūtras of Aṣṭādhyāyī, whenever a word occurs in ṣaṣṭhī, without any qualification, it will assume the meaning of 'in the place of'.

The adhikāra sūtras are usually translated as headings. For instance, 2.13 (prākkaḍārātsamāsaḥ) states “all the terms that we shall describe from this point up to the sūtra 2.2.38 (kaḍarākarmadhāraye) will get the designation of samāsa or compound.” Similarly, 3.1.1 (pratyayaḥ) states that the third, fourth and fifth chapters deal with affixes. Thus, we see that the validity of adhikāra sūtras extends over many sūtras. Thus, in a sense they are super-vidhi sūtras. These are marked with a svarita tone, so that a student might know which sūtras extend their influence. In printed texts, some notation or the other, such as marking adhikāra sūtras in bold print, is followed.

An extension rule extends the operation of a rule to a given item as well. An example would be out of place in an introductory essay, such as this, but suffice to say that unlike an adhikāra sūtra, the application of an extension sūtra is much more restricted, usually to one sūtra.

A niyama sūtra restricts the application of a previous rule. This marks exceptions to the vidhi rules. A niṣedha sūtra is a negation. For instance 1.1.9 (tulyāsya prayatnam savarṇam) defines savarṇas as those which have a comparable effort in producing the varṇa. The immediate next sūtra, 1.1.10 (nājjhalau) clarifies that vowels and consonants cannot be savarṇas.

Based on these rules, a vritti is made of the sūtras. A vritti is a complete, intelligible sentence which gives the intent of the sūtra.

8. The Arrangement of Sutras in the Aṣṭādhyāyī

The Aṣṭādhyāyī was composed in the days when such texts were learnt by heart first and then the application was understood, practiced and mastered. Consequently, it is expected that all the nearly 4,000 sūtras be applied simultaneously in a given situation to determine the correct grammatical transformation. In case more than one sūtra is capable of being applied, but there is a conflict in the force of such competing sūtras, usually the latter prevails. Depending on the type of sūtra, the order of preference in case of conflict varies. The order of preference for different types of sūtras is clearly laid out.

The exception to the above arrangement is spelt out in 7.2.1 (pūrvatrāsiddham) which states that the earlier sūtras be treated as not valid. Thus, in the first seven chapters and a quarter (referred to as sapādi, with the quarter), the sūtras are applied progressively, one after other to a given situation; in the last three quarters (the tripādi) the same arrangement continues, but with the sūtras in the first seven chapters and a quarter not being valid.

The application of Aṣṭādhyāyī to a given situation requires considerable intellectual prowess, so much so that not all word forms are settled. Even after it was applied competently for a number of centuries, it is possible to launch into a discussion of what the correct form of a particular word is. The scope for Śāstrārtha discussion on even such a simple matter as how should 'rupees five hundred' be expressed in Sanskrit is considerable.

Such difficulties gave rise to the need for a simpler way to study the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Early attempts were to re-organise it under subject-matters, prakaraṇas. These attempts, over many iterations spread across centuries reached a perfect shape in the sixteenth century in the form of Siddhāntakaumudi.

9. The Siddhāntakaumudi

The Siddhāntakaumudi, composed in the 16th century by Bhattoji Dīkṣita, rearranges the 3978 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī under various groupings, more similar to a modern book of grammar. Along with the sūtra is given a short explanatory comment by Bhattoji Dīkṣita. The key job done by these comments or notes is point out application of other sūtras along with the present one, or where other seemingly contradictory rules are not applicable.

This has become so popular that for the last four hundred years, the Aṣṭādhyāyī was mainly studied in the form of the Siddhāntakaumudi, not in its original form. Swami Dayānanda Saraswati, the founder of Ārya Samāj, promoted the study of Aṣṭādhyāyī in its original form more than a hundred years ago. Notwithstanding the sustained efforts of Āryasamājis ever since, Siddhāntakaumudi with its derived texts, mainly the Laghu Siddhāntakaumudi remains the most popular text for learning grammar.

Bhattoji Dīkṣita himself wrote a commentary on Siddhāntakaumudi called Prauḍhamanorama, where he establishes that only Pāṇini, Kātyāyana and Patanjali may be accepted as authorities on matters of grammar. There have been other commentaries on Siddhāntakaumudi, including a couple – brihacchabdaratna and laghuśabdratna by the grandson of Bhattoji Dīkṣita, Hari Dīkṣita.

The Siddhāntakaumudi includes commentary on the uṇādi sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and liṅgānuśāsanam, apart from the commentary on māheśvarasūtras and the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

10. Contents of Grammar

A proper description of the grammar of Sanskrit ought to include descriptions of the various elements. With a view that this job is best done by presenting the contents divided amongst the various prakaraṇas of the Siddhāntakaumudi, the contents of grammar are explained in brief in the following pages, with the beginner in focus.

10.1 Ground rules

The first chapter of the Siddhāntakaumudi puts together most of the Definitions (sanjñā rules) and the Rules of Interpretation (paribhāṣa) before dealing with the subject proper.

10.2 Sandhi

Sandhi is the coalescence of two letters in immediate contact. For instance, cup+board results in cupboard with the conjunct syllable 'pb' being pronounced as 'bb'. Thus, sandhi is something which is common to all languages, not merely Sanskrit. At any rate, to a large extent this is true of Indian languages. We find that the rules of sandhi in Sanskrit are sometimes not followed in Dravidian languages. For instance a + u results in o in Sanskrit, as in sūrya + udayam = sūryodayam. However, bengaLa + ūru = bengaLūru, not bengaLoru, but when it comes to sūryodaya, the Sanskrit rule is followed. Even in Sanskrit, we have exceptions to the general rule. To continue with the ‘a + u’ combination, akṣa + ūhini = akṣauhini (a military unit consisting of 21,870 chariots, 21,870 elephants, 65,610 horses and 1,09,350 foot soldiers), not akṣohini; pra + ūḍha = prauḍha (full grown, mature), not proḍha.

The vowel 'o' is by definition the combination of 'a' and 'u' (hence it has no short form in Sanskrit, unlike in Dravidian languages) and when such a combination results in a diphthong 'au' (a diphthong is a combination of two vowels; 'ai' and 'au' are the diphthongs in Sanskrit, as the term is used in English), or does not result in the combinatorial vowel 'o' (though the two vowels forming this sound are not clearly discernible, 'e' and 'o' are referred to as diphthongs by Sanskrit grammarians).

In the above examples, we see that exceptions to the pure, technical rules are found. These exceptions occur by force of usage. Linguists have observed several tendencies – towards simplification in most cases – which go against strict, narrow technical rules. The rules of Sandhi in grammar deal with both the generic, technical rules and rules which take note of the convention of usage. For those who argue that Paninian grammar is prescriptive and has frozen Sanskrit, this should make it clear that the Paninian grammar was descriptive when it was composed.

The Sandhis are classified as vowel sandhis, non-sandhis (that is rules describing the occasions where sandhi does not occur), visarga sandhi and hal-sandhi (coalescence of final consonants with vowels and consonants). Another useful classification is internal sandhi and external sandhi. Internal sandhi refers to the sandhi amongst case endings, verbal affixes, prefixes and suffixes which results in the formation of a word; external sandhi is what occurs between words, whether they form a compound or not.

External sandhi is more familiar to speakers of other Indian languages. In the earlier example, sūryodaya, we see an external sandhi. In saṁ + krita = saṁskrita (put together, well done, refined), we find an example of both an internal sandhi and a description of usage, rather a prescriptive rule.

As will be seen later, modern English differs from Sanskrit in treatment of compound words. This tendency to spilt compound words is observed in several Indian languages as well. Here it is pertinent to note that sandhi is nitya, that is, sandhi rules ought to be always followed in case of internal sandhi and in case of compound words. External sandhi, not amongst compound words, is up to the speaker in speech or prose, but compulsory in verse.

For a beginner, external sandhi is taught, while rules governing internal sandhi are passed over. Actually the rules governing sandhi apply equally to internal and external sandhis, but certain rules are exclusively or mostly applicable to internal sandhi; these are the rules which are not taught to beginners. Also, the examples given are mainly those of external sandhi.

10.3 Declensions

A noun changes its form depending on the number and case of the noun. For instance book is a singular; books, plural. Case is the English word for vibhakti. We have rules such as the karta, doer or subject, is in prathamā vibhakti; the karta, or object, is in dvitīyā vibhakti; and the karaṇa, instrument is in the tritīyā vibhakti. The first three cases are respectively called nominative, accusative and instrumental cases; the next four are dative, ablative, genitive and locative. The sambodhana prathamā vibhakti is called the vocative.

The various forms of the noun in different cases and numbers are called 'declensions' and a noun (or adjective or pronoun) is said to decline. Such changes are also called inflections. Inflection, technically, has a larger scope since it includes the changes in verbs, called 'conjugation'. Nouns do not decline much in English except for number (singular and plural); another common occurrence is the genitive, formed by the addition of an apostrophe and 's'. Sanskrit nouns (and six other parts of speech, that is, all except verbs) decline profusely, with the addition of a dual number, not common in other familiar languages. While, technically every subanta has 21 (or 24) forms, distinct forms are lesser than that. The dual number has only three forms (nominative and accusative; instrumental, dative and ablative; genitive and locative), while the plural has only six forms (the dative and the ablative are always identical). There are a class of words called avyayas or indeclinables which do not decline. In other words, they have an identical form in all the three numbers and seven cases.

Nominally, a noun form is formed by the addition of a case affix called a 'sup' to the noun stem. They are 21 case affixes, starting with 'su', 'au', 'jas' and ending with 'ṅi', 'os', 'sup'. By combining the first letter of these affixes 'su' with the last letter 'p', we get 'sup' which refers to the set of 21 affixes.

The addition of these affixes is far from simple. They usually change depending upon the gender of the noun stem, prātipadika. Then they are elaborate sandhi rules. At the end of it all, a noun declines as illustrated below:

akārāntaḥ pulliṅgaḥ rāma śabdaḥ
rāmaḥ rāmau rāmāḥ prathamā vibhaktiḥ
rāmam rāmau rāmān dvitīyā vibhaktiḥ
rāmeṇa rāmābhyāṁ rāmaiḥ tritīyā vibhaktiḥ
rāmāya rāmābhyāṁ rāmebhyaḥ caturthī vibhaktiḥ
rāmāt rāmābhyāṁ rāmebhyaḥ pañcamī vibhaktiḥ
rāmasya rāmayoḥ rāmāṇāṁ ṣaṣṭhī vibhaktiḥ
rāme rāmayoḥ rāmeṣu saptamī vibhaktiḥ
he rāma he rāmau he rāmāḥ sambodhana prathamā vibhaktiḥ

The process of deriving each of the above forms is called rūpasiddhi (literally, attainment of form) which demonstrates one's mastery of grammar. This process is so complicated that vibhakti forms are learnt by heart, independently of grammar. These forms vary depending on the gender of the noun (and the other six parts of speech, henceforth noun in this context shall include the other subantas as well) and the last letter of the noun. A traditional text, śabdamañjarī, lists about 175 of these forms. A Kerala version lists 200.

For a beginner, the rules of grammar relevant to declensions are usually not taught; instead a sub-set of the vibhakti forms are taught, usually masculine and neuter nouns ending in a, i, u, ṛ, t; feminine nouns ending in ā, i, ī, ū, ṛ; and a few pronouns. Even advanced learners tend to learn the rest of the vibhaktis first and attempt rūpasiddhi, if at all, later.

A mnemonic verse which lists the singular forms of rāma in various cases and also demonstrates the basic syntax of the usage of case is given below:

rāmo rājamaṇiḥ sadā vijayate rāmam rameśam bhaje,
rāmeṇābhihathā niśācaracamū rāmāya tasmai namaḥ |
rāmānnāsti parāyaṇam parataram rāmasya dāso'smyaham,
rāme citta laya sadā bhavatu me bho rāma māmuddhara ||

10.4 Indeclinables

As mentioned earlier, an avyaya or an indeclinable has the same form in all numbers and cases, and also the three genders. Additionally, there are a few nouns called nipātas, which have an identical form everywhere: anyat, astam, om, canas, cāṭu, namas, nāsti, bhūr, bhuvar, vadi, śam, śudi, sudi, saṁvat, svāhā, svadhā, svar and svasti.

The different types of indeclinables are a) prepositions, b) adverbs, c) particles, d) conjunctions and e) interjections. There are about 20 prepositions, called upasargas; about 300 words used adverbially, 9 particles (ad, kā, ku, cana, cit, na, sma, vit and svī), about fifty conjunctions and about forty interjections.

Of these, the upasargas are the most important. They combine with verb stems and multiply the available vocabulary. Then, they combine with other nouns to form compound words called avyayībhāvas, which are themselves indeclinable.

A beginner is usually introduced only to upasargas; the other indeclinables are explained as and when they are encountered, rather than being taught formally as a component of grammar.

10.5 Formation of Feminine Bases

In Sanskrit, nouns, adjectives and the subantas are formed from verbal roots by the additions of krit and other affixes. The word so formed is usually masculine. To these masculine words, addition of 'ā', 'ī', 'ū' and 'ti' results in the feminine. This addition is subject to a set of rules collated under the chapter formation of feminine bases. A beginner usually understands the application of the more important of these rules by exposure. A format study is taking up in advanced stage.

10.6 Cases (kārakas)

Kārakaprakaraṇa is the part of grammar that deals with syntax. To be sure, Sanskrit syntax properly extends beyond the kārakas to include concordance (agreement of the adjective with the noun and agreement of the verb with the subject), usage of pronouns and the usage of numerous participles. Many of these are by convention and usage by respected authors. This situation led to the comment amongst western Indologists that if Sanskrit grammar is lacking in any area, it is in syntax. To quote Dr. H. Kern in his introduction to 'Sanskrit Syntax' by Dr. J. S. Speijer (published by E. J. Brill, Leyden, 1886), “Indian grammar, which is virtually the same as saying Pāṇini's grammar, superior as it is in many respects to anything of the kind produced among other civilized nations of antiquity, is profoundly deficient in its treatment of syntax”.

There are six kārakas corresponding to the seven cases, save the genitive.

Karaka Case Usage Example
kartā Nominative (prathamā) Naming or default case; denotes the subject when used with a verb rāmo rājamaniḥ| Rama is a jewel among kings.
karma Accusative (dvitīyā) Denotes the object rāmam bhaje| [I] worship Rama.
karaṇa Instrumental (tritīyā) Denotes the agent or instrument of action rāmeṇa abhihatāḥ niśācaracamūḥ| The army of demons is killed by Rama.
sampradāna Dative (caturthī) Denotes the person to whom something is given or offered; or an object with reference to which an action of offering is made rāmāya namaḥ| I offer salutations to Rama (this translation is to convey the sense of the dative; the proper translation is 'I bow to Rama'.)
apādāna Ablative (paṅcamī) The primary sense is that of separation and moving away from, real or figurative. rāmāt nāsti parāyaṇaṁ parataram| There is no higher path than [that of] Rama.
adhikaraṇa Locative (saptamī) Denotes the place where an action takes place, with reference to the subject or object. rāme me cittalaya sadā bhavatu| May my heart always be fixated upon Rama.

All senses not expressed by the kārakas are expressed by the genitive. Technically, the genitive expresses the relation of one noun to another in a sentence. In 'rāmasya dāsaḥ asmi aham' (I am the servant of Rama), the speaker belongs to Rama, in the capacity of a servant and hence Rama is expressed in the genitive case. Additionally, we have the vocative case, treated as a variant of the nominative case which denotes the person being addressed, as in 'bho rāma! mām uddhara' (O Rama! Uplift me).

There are two other cases called the locative absolute and the genitive absolute. It is best to introduce the Absolute case by quoting Alexander Bain from his “Higher English Grammar” (published by Longmans & Co., London, 1879):

When the participle agrees with a Subject different from the Subject of the Verb, the Phrase is said to be in Absolute Construction: 'the sun having risen, we commenced our journey'; 'this said, he sat down'.

Whereas the nominative is used as the absolute in English, the locative absolute is the most popular in Sanskrit, and referred to as 'sati saptamī'. The genitive absolute, used less frequently to show contempt or disregard, is referred to as 'sataḥ ṣaṣṭhī’. It may be noted that both 'sati' and 'sataḥ' are the locative and genitive singulars of the word 'san', to be. The absolute case is used to convey the sense of English particles 'when', 'while', 'since' and 'although'.

A good understanding of the common usage of the various cases is fundamental to make any progress in learning Sanskrit. Though the absolute case is somewhat difficult to initially master, it is used very frequently and the beginner should be at least able to identify the absolute case, if not be actually able to use it properly. The less frequent usages of different cases may be initially omitted.

Here it is pertinent to note a tendency amongst schools to make children learn up to 20 vibhakti patterns by rote, but omitting to properly introduce the kārakas. The declensions, learnt with such difficulty, make sense only when the student knows how to use them and for that a preliminary understanding of the matter treated above is absolutely essential. If the object being learnt has a purpose, it makes the act of learning less of a chore and more interesting. This is recognised by agencies outside the school system, who in the name of 'Spoken Sanskrit' introduce copious sentences in all the cases.

10.7 Compound words

When two or more words are joined together, a compound word is formed, called samāsa (saṁ, together + as, be) in Sanskrit. Usually the relation between the words is not mentioned. When required, the compound is resolved, giving the relationship between the words joined. For instance, 'lokanātha' can mean 'the lord of the world' or 'one to whom the world is the lord'. The sentence which resolves a compound is called a vigraha vākya.

The rules of sandhi are observed when the words forming a compound come together. In all respects, the compound word behaves like a word and takes case affixes and can form other compounds. One criticism of later developments in Sanskrit is that the compounds became very long – often running to a full page – doing the duty of full fledged sentences. Compounds are variously classified in four, five or six groups, with further sub-classification. The samāsakusumāvaliḥ gives examples of about a hundred types of samāsas, with examples of compounds along with their resolutions.

A note about writing compound words is in order. English has developed a convention of writing compound words such as 'civil servant' with a space in between. In contrast, German is more insistent that a compound word retain its fundamental character of being a single word. Thus, we have the German Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (National Socialist German Workers Party) shortened to Nazi Party using the first two letters of the two words in the first compound. It may also be noted that the last word, 'workers party' is also a compound. Following the English convention, Indians started writing names as Pāmulaparti Venkaṭa Narasiṁha Rao, whereas the correct way of writing such a name ought to be Pāmulaparti (called the upanāma in Sanskrit) Venkaṭanarasiṁharao. The same convention extends to Shiva Kumar, Nārāyaṇ Dutt and so on. However Indirā Priyadarśinī maybe written as such, as Priyadarśinī can also be an adjective describing Indirā. Having said this, it must be mentioned that conventions develop over time and the general usage becomes the standard usage. For instance, the spaces between separate words, along with other punctuation marks are all the result of modern printing technology. Old manuscripts have but two punctuation marks, the pūrṇa virāma (a single stick, or daṇḍa as in '|') and dīrgha virāma (two sticks, as in '||'). An example is reproduced below (the first two lines of Rig Veda).

By modern convention, there ought to be a space in the first sentence after śrīgaṇeśāya, as in 'śrīgaṇeśāya namaḥ|', but such conventions are not seen in the earlier forms of writing. This being a pada pāṭha, each word is however separated by a daṇḍa. Normally the sandhi is done in 'agnimīLe', in the samhitā pāṭha, but not in the pada pāṭha. We notice that the daṇḍa separator is absent after the first word in the compound word 'purohitaṁ', which is however broken into its constituent words.

A mastery of kārakas is required to write the vigraha vākyas, resolution of compounds. The beginner need not bother with all the classifications and sub-classifications or with the vigraha vākyas, as long as the sense conveyed by the samāsas is adequately understood. Once the basics are learnt, a working knowledge of compounds ought to be acquired for it is almost impossible to find any fragment of non-vedic Sanskrit without compounds.

10.8 Taddhitas or Secondary Derivatives

Vritti is the general term for any complex formation in Sanskrit requiring explanation or resolution. We have just examined one such vritti, the samāsa. The other vrittis are ekaśeṣa vritti (similar to the dvandvasamāsa), kridvritti (formation of words from roots or verb-stems by primary affixes), dhātuvritti (formation of derivative verbs from primary roots) and taddhitavritti (formation of derivative bases from nouns by secondary affixes).

For instance, Rama is referred to as dāśarathi, by virtue of being the son of Daśaratha. Bhārata, kaurava, pāṇḍava, pārtha, gāṅgeya, śāntanu, rāghava, pārvatī, draupadī, yādava, bhārgava, vāsudeva, and bhāradvāja are all examples of names derived from ancestors by addition of secondary affixes. Pitāmaha, mātula etc. are examples of nouns derived from descendants. Taddhithas are not restricted to persons alone. Often books are named as a secondary derivative of the author. Thus, Govindarājīyam is the commentary on Ramayana by Govindarāja and Śāṅkarabhāṣya is the bhāṣya written by Śaṅkara. Another taddhita pratyaya, 'in' conveys the sense of possession: thus, daṇḍin is somebody with a staff, daṇḍa; guṇin, with guṇa; cakrin, with cakra (Viṣnu) and so on.

There are more than 70 taddhita pratyayas, and are most profusely used. Taddhitas seem to be preferred from a stylistic point as well, more so amongst the Southerners. One such excessive use of taddhitas by Kātyāyana led the bhāṣyakāra to comment 'priyataddhitāḥ dākṣiṇātyāḥ' and that lable stuck since then.

10.9 Conjugation of Roots

Conjugation refers to the changes that a verb undergoes. For instance, the verb 'boil' changes to 'boils' 'boiled', 'boiling', 'will boil' and so on. In Sanskrit the verb changes its forms in the three forms – singular, dual and plural – and three persons: Third person, second person and first person. Thus, paṭh (to read) takes various forms depending on who the subject is: sā pāṭhati (she reads), chātrāḥ paṭhanti (students read) or aham paṭhāmi (I read). The various forms of the verb paṭh in present tense are given below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa paṭhati paṭhataḥ paṭhanti
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa paṭhasi paṭhatha paṭhathaḥ
First Person uttamapuruṣa paṭhāmi paṭhāvah paṭhāmah

The difference in nomenclature between English and Sanskrit is to be noted. The literal translation of prathamapuruṣa ought to be the first person, but it corresponds to the third person in English.

10.9.1 The Six Tenses

The three most familiar tenses or simple tenses are the present, past and future. Sanskrit has three more tenses: two more varieties of past tense and an additional variety of future tense. Additionally, there are four moods. We will examine each of these in turn.

One variety of the past tense is Past Perfect or simply Perfect, called parokṣabhūtaḥ in Sanskrit, meaning something which happened long ago. An example would be: rājā daśaratho nāma babhūva (there was a king called Dasaratha). That was thousands of years ago; Dasaratha is no longer around. This is the perfect past; the Imperfect Past is the opposite of it: bālaḥ phalaṁ akhādat (boy ate fruit). Conceivably, this happened sometime back. The technical rule is that this ought to be used when the event is capable of being witnessed by the speaker. In practice that is often not the case. Then, there is a third kind of past tense, which is supposed to be indefinite about whether the action is complete or not. Based on the Greek word for indefinite, this is called the Aorist. A lot of this terminology came from early studies in Indo-European languages, but the lables can sometimes confuse the beginner. From the above description, a sensible approach would be to use the Aorist heavily and use the Perfect and Imperfect tenses with precision and clarity; that however is not the case. The most commonly used verb form of past tense is the Imperfect and the Sanskrit Imperfect is quite different from the English Imperfect (called the Past Continuous or Past Progressive). In English the Imperfect or Past Continuous requires the action to have started in the past and to continue into the present, as in “I was eating”. That is not the case in Sanskrit, as we saw in the example of “boy ate fruit”. This is not to say that the lable-givers were wrong. In fact, in other Indo-European languages, the Imperfect indeed refers to only past actions; English is more the exception. The older names for these tenses were 1st Preterite (Imperfect), 2nd Preterite (Perfect) and 3rd Preterite (Aorist). Preterite, from the Latin equivalent of bhūta, is the same as past tense.

There are two future tenses, referred to as 1st Future and 2nd Future, or Periphrastic Future and Simple Future, in that order. Periphrastic is another unfamiliar technical word of grammar. ‘Peri’ is the prefix meaning about, around etc; ‘phrastic’ is derived from phrase. Thus, periphrastic means phrase-like. A periphrastic verb is a verb form constructed using an auxiliary verb, as in “he did say...”. This is, it will be observed, different from the simple inflected or conjugated verb form in “he said...”. A periphrastic verb is different from a phrasal verb, which is a verb combined with an adverb and/or a preposition, as “speak up”. The 1st future in Sanskrit refers to an action that would occur at a definite time in future but not this day, whereas the 2nd future refers to an action that would occur at an indefinite time in future including today, and to denote recent and future continuous time.

Thus, in place of three familiar tenses (actually there are more than three tenses in English such as past perfect and present perfect continuous), we have six tenses in Sanskrit.

10.9.2 The Four Moods

In addition to the six tenses, we have four 'moods'. Mood captures the 'attitude' of the speaker. Let us say the principal of the School sends a directive for school children regarding the Republic Day event at school. If the directive says, 'all teachers must attend', it is said to be in imperative mood; if it further states that 'all school buses would run in their normal routes as many children may attend' , the underlined part is said to be in potential mood; if the directive ends with something along the lines of 'may our children strengthen this Republic further', it is in a benedictive mood. The fourth is called the conditional where the action of the verb is conditional upon another event. In English, an example would be “If it rains, he won't go”. There is another closely related mood called Subjunctive, which has a sense of “subject to”. Here the difference is: the subjunctive expresses “wishes, commands, emotion, possibility, judgment, opinion, necessity, or statements that are contrary to fact at present”. To modify our above example, “If it were to rain, he would not go”, would convey the sense that the speaker does not wish 'him' to go and so wants rain, though there is no rain or indication of rain presently. This is the sense conveyed by the Subjunctive. The subjunctive is used only in the Vedic language.

We have started the introduction saying there are four moods, but listed five: Imperative, Potential, Benedictive, Conditional and Subjunctive. This is so because the Potential and Benedictive are two forms of what is simply referred to as liṅ in Sanskrit. The Potential is called vidhiliṅ and the Benedictive is called āśīrliṅ. Since the Subjunctive is not studied in the laukika grammar, the two liṅs are separately studied.

10.9.3 Alternative Names for Moods

Some books on Sanskrit grammar mention other moods such as the Injunctive, Optative and Precative. These are best understood by first knowing the meaning of these terms. The Injunctive is related to the word used so commonly in courts: 'injunction'. An injunction is an order, a command. The Optative is derived from the same root as 'option' and conveys a sense of choice. In grammar, the mood expressing a preferred choice amongst alternatives, that is a wish, is called the Optative. The precative is related to 'pray', and expresses an entreaty, supplication, a prayer. These terms are used in the grammar of Greek and Latin, and attempts were made to find equivalents in Sanskrit.

The equivalent in Sanskrit for the Injunctive is found in the Aorist. There are seven (according to M. R. Kale) or three varieties (according to Western grammarians of Sanskrit) of the Aorist, and the Injunctive is one of those. The difference between the Imperative and Injunctive is in terms of affixes, augmentation and historical development, rather than in usage. Similarly, the Precative and Optative are, in one interpretation, forms of the Aorist. S. C. Vasu however treats the Potential as the same as the Optative. In dealing with all these lables, the point of view of the author is of much significance. For somebody not interested in comparative studies, these lables are less than helpful. What is important, and which is clear enough in the traditional classification, is to know which form expresses a command, wish, blessing, prayer, possibility and conditionality.

One other lable might be mentioned: the pluperfect, which may be roughly thought of as the complete or supremely perfect; in English it has an easier lable, the past perfect tense. It is usually stated that Sanskrit has no pluperfect. This is true in the sense of comparison with Greek, but Sanskrit is perfectly capable of expressing actions fully completed in the past using the various participles, the locative absolute and such others. In the more advanced books on grammar, usually remarks are made as to how a given particle or tense serves the function of the pluperfect as well. There it is most useful to substitute past perfect for the pluperfect.

Pāṇini's lables are purely nominal, devoid of any meaning, as tabulated below:

S. No. lakāra Descriptive Lable Sense conveyed 3rd Person, Singular form of bhū
1 laṭ Present tense Action taking place at the present time, recently completed or in the immediate future (where are you going?); habitual or repeated action; and others. bhavati
2 liṭ Perfect tense or 2nd Preterite Action done before the current day and not witnessed by the speaker; action which takes place when the speaker was unconscious or distracted babhūva
3 luṭ First future or Periphrastic future tenses Definite futurity, not today (he would donate food on the amāvāsya). bhavitā
4 lṛiṭ Second future or simple future tense Indefinite futurity (he would donate food life-long); including today; and others. bhaviṣyati
5 leṭ Subjunctive mood Wish etc. subject to action contrary to present state taking place (If I were the Prime Minister of India,...); and others. Used only in the Vedas.
6 loṭ Imperative mood Command; entreaty; benediction; courteous enquiry; gentle advice and others. bhavatu, bhavatāt
7 laṅ * Imperfect tense or 1st Preterite Past action not done today, and others. Presently, the most commonly used form of the past tense. abhavat
8 liṅ vidhiliṅ Potential mood Vidhi (duty), nimantraṇa (invitation), āmantraṇa (permission), adhīṣṭa (attend honorary office), sampraśna (courteous enquiry), prārthana (prayer) and others. bhavet
āśīrliṅ Benedictive mood Blessings bhūyāt
9 luṅ Aorist or 3rd Preterite Past action indefinitely, without reference to any particular time; and others abhūt
10 lṛiṅ Conditional mood Action conditional upon something abhaviṣyat

* This is pronounced like the English 'lung'; similarly others are pronounced as ling, lung, and lring.

There remain two more details of the verb to be noticed: the voice (active, passive, impersonal) and the personal terminations. There are two personal terminations called parasmaipada and Atmanepada that roots take to form verbs. Theoretically, when the fruit of action of a verb occurs to the speaker, Atmanepada is used; when it does not accrue to the speaker, parasmaipada is used. Some verbs are exclusively parasmaipada verbs, others exclusively Atmanepada verbs; some admit both affixes, and are called ubhayapadas. There are a few which change from one category to another, if preceded by certain prefixes. The terminations for the Atmanepada verbs are different from the parasmaipada terminations. To give a feel for the difference between parasmaipada and Atmanepada conjugations, the Atmanepada verb, labh (to gain), is conjugated in the present tense below:

English Person Sanskrit Person Singular Dual Plural
Third Person prathamapuruṣa labhate labhete labhante
Second Person madhyamapuruṣa labhase labhethe labhadhve
First Person uttamapuruṣa labhe labhāvahe labhāmahe

It may be noted that Atmanepada conjugations for the ten tenses and moods are distinct from the parasmaipada conjugations in those ten lakāras.

Verbs which admit an object, or karma, are called sakarmakadhātus, or transitive verbs. These may be expressed in the active voice or passive voice. For instance, ‘Rama reads the book’ (rāmaḥ pustakaṁ pāṭhati) is in active voice; in the passive voice, the sentence is rewritten as: The book is being read by Rama (rāmeṇa pustakaḥ paṭhyate). Read is called a transitive verb. Some verbs do not admit an object, as in, 'I sleep'. Such verbs are called intransitive verbs, or akarmakadhātus. For such verbs, the passive construction is called impersonal passive, or bhāve prayogaḥ. There is a third kind of passive called the reflexive, as in 'rice is cooked' (odanaḥ pacyate). Irrespective of which passive the verb takes, the conjugation of the verb in the passive voice is similar. As it happens, it is identical with the conjugation of verbs of the 4th class Atmanepada verbs.

Thus, we see that verbs can be conjugated in ten tenses and moods, nine forms in each tense or mood, corresponding to the three numbers and the three persons; that is each verb changes itself into ninety forms. Then we need to add the forms in passive voice, which adds another 90 forms. Since the passive forms and Atmanepada forms are identical, for every verb a student needs to learn 180 verb forms. Since this may be quite daunting, during the initial stages only five lakāras are introduced: present, imperfect and simple future tense; imperative and potential moods. This cuts the load in half, but knowing these forms and declension of about twenty of the more important noun and pronoun forms is essential to be able to read anything in Sanskrit.

10.10 Derivative Verbs

There are four kinds of derivative verbs, called pratyayāntadhātus: Causals (ṇijantas), Desideratives (sannantas), Frequentatives (yaṅantas) and Denominatives (nāmadhātus).

A causal verb is different from an ordinary verb in that the agent of action, karta, causes another to do the action rather than do it himself. Thus, “Rama makes [the students] read”, rāmaḥ pāṭhayati. These are formed by the addition of the affix 'ṇic' (which is actually a plain 'i' with a head, 'ṇ' and tail 'c', for ease of pronunciation). Words ending in 'ṇic' are ṇijantas (the transformation of the last harsh 'ca' into the softer 'ja' being a feature of sandhi). This is another 'artificial' or nominal non-descriptive lable of Pāṇini. Other teachers refer to this also as prayojakārthakas. The conjugation of these causal verbs is exactly similar to the conjugation of verbs in the tenth class. This somewhat reduces the burden on the student.

The Desiderative verb expresses the desire of the agent of action to perform the action, or to be in the condition, denoted by the root or the desiderative base. pipaṭhiṣati, [he] wishes to study, is derived from the root, paṭh. Nominal and participle derivates of the desiderative verb are fairly common, not only in Sanskrit but in other Indian languages as well. Śuśrūṣā, the desire to listen, has acquired the meaning of 'service' as a student desirous of learning more would serve his guru with obedience and diligence. The rūdhi or established meaning of 'service' is so prominent that we have nursing homes named somewhat inappropriately, if only etymologically speaking, Śuśrūṣā. Another common noun derived from the desiderative is 'mumukṣu', the one desirous of mokṣa, liberation.

The Frequentative or Intensive verb expresses repetition or intensity of the action conveyed by the base verb. From 'dīp', to shine, is derived 'dedīpyate' [it] shines brightly; and dedīpyamāna, shining brightly.

Sanskrit nouns (and others together known as subantas) are formed from verb-roots, but a class of verbs called Denominatives are formed from the nouns. A good modern example in English would be 'googling'. Verbs putrīyati, rājīyati, from putra and rājan, express the desire of the speaker for a son and a king. Some of the denominatives are used to convey the sense of treating like, as in 'he treats his student like a son.' There is a list of 50 roots starting with kaṇḍu, referred to as kaṇḍvādigaṇa, which are both roots and nouns; these also form denominatives similarly.

10.12 Kridantas or Krit affixes

The affixes starting with 'krit' are called krit affixes and words formed by the addition of krit affixes are called kridantas, [words] ending in krit. The name krit itself is derived from a sūtra of Aṣṭādhyāyī: 3.1.63 krit-atiṅ, all affixes except tiṅ are krit. Addition of krit affixes results in the formation of declinable and indeclinable participles. Participle, as in the past participle ‘broken’ is well known, with students reciting lists such as ‘break, broke, broken’. At the stage where these lists are taught, the meaning of a participle is not explained in great detail.

A participle gets its name because the word called the participle does the job of an adjective by 'participating' in the action denoted by the verb. For instance, in the sentence, 'The Australian leg spinner carried many cans of baked beans' the word 'baked' describes beans and thus works like an adjective; yet like green, large of fresh, baked is not really an adjective; rather it is closely associated with the verb, 'bake'. Similarly in a 'broken widow pane' and 'a burning train', a word derived from a verb serves as an adjective. Applying the same lable to kridantas in Sanskrit is somewhat amusing, as all the adjectives (and nouns and other parts of speech, together referred to as subantas) are held and shown to be derived from verbal roots; so participles are not really a separate class in Sanskrit. With this quirk of the descriptive lable 'participle' being kept in mind, we will examine the kridantas proper.

The Present Participle is formed by the addition of 'at' (with the addition of a head and tail, it is usually referred to as śatṛ) to the root, as in paṭhat (reading). This is possible only for parasmaipada roots; for Atmanepada roots, another affix 'āna' (śānac) is added, as in vardhamāna (growing). The past participles are formed by adding 'vas' and 'āna' to parasmaipada and Atmanepada verbs. The past passive participle is formed by 'ta' (ktavat) to the verb as in bhūta (become) or snāta (bathed). Potential participles are formed by addition of 'tavya', 'anīya' and 'ya' as in kartavyam or karaṇīyam (that which ought to be done, therefore, duty). These and the other participles of the future tense and past active are all adjectives and decline as subantas do.

The gerund formed by the addition of 'ktvā' (to simple words) or 'ya' (lyap, in case of words with a prefix) are indeclinable. Thus, we have jṅātva (having known) from the root jṅā (to know); if we add a prefix, say 'vi', the gerund is formed differently: vijṅāya (having known well). The gerund or the indeclinable past participle is formed by addition of other affixes as well. Another important indeclinable participle is the infinitive, formed by the addition of 'tum' (tumun), as in kartuṁ (in order to do) or paṭhituṁ (in order to study). The krit affixes are quite numerous. In addition to those briefly mentioned above, another 60 are listed in M. R. Kale's 'A Higher Sanskrit Grammar'.

The krit affixes are the key behind the huge vocabulary of Sanskrit and its potential to coin new words to keep pace with technological developments. This potential, in fact, is realised through other Indian languages like Hindi, with new words being coined to describe modern developments. To give one example of how important the krit affixes are in usage, given below is a list of 31 words formed by addition of krit affixes to the root 'bhū' listed in the 'brihaddhāturatnākaraḥ' of Harekānta Miśra: bhavitavyam, bhavanīyam, bhavyam, bhāvyam, bhūtaḥ, bhūtavān, bhavan, bhavantī, bhaviṣyan, bhaviṣyatī, bhaviṣyantī, bhavituṁ, bhūtvā, sambhūya, bhavitā, bhavitrī, bhūṣṇūḥ, bhaviṣṇuḥ, bhāvukaḥ, vibhuḥ, prabhuḥ, bhūti, bhāva, prabhavaḥ, bhavaḥ, bhavanaṁ, bhuvanaṁ, bhūmiḥ, adbhutaḥ.

10.13 Uṇādi Sutras

The best way to introduce and describe these sūtras would be to quote Srisa Chandra Vasu, in the introductory passage to uṇādi sūtras, in his translation of the Siddhāntakaumudi: “The Uṇādi suffixes, though as necessary as the Kridanta ones, and as important as the taddhita suffixes added to the nouns of the gana-pāṭha are seldom treated of in ordinary treatises of grammar as an essential subject of grammatical instruction. Pāṇini himself, though diffuse in other respects, stops short when treating Uṇādi by saying “Unādyo bahulaṁ”, (they are too many). Moreover the formation of Uṇādi words are so very arbitrary and complicated on account of the insertion, transposition, substitution and transmission of the letters by the indeterminate laws of prosthesis, epenthesis, metathesis, paragoge, synalepha, synesis, synacresis, synecphonesis and others, that it can hardly be brought under the definite rules of permutation by sandhi, or reduced under the strictest forms of grammar for the adhesion of these suffixes. The primary significance of the root is utterly lost in the derivative word formed from it.”

There are 751 Uṇādi sūtras in addition to the nearly 4,000 sūtras of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. The Uṇādi affixes themselves number 325.

10.14 Vedic Grammar and Rules Governing Accents

The rules pertaining to the Vedic usage have been collated and given in eight chapters under the heading vaidikī prakriyā towards the end of the Siddhāntakaumudi. The rules in each chapter correspond to the rules found in that particular adhyāya of the Aṣṭādhyāyī. Along with the various vedic diversities, this section also deals with 'leṭ', the Vedic Subjunctive, which turns out to be a composite mood, with six tenses: Present, Imperfect, Present Conditional, Imperfect Conditional, Strong Present Conditional, and Strong Imperfect Conditional – with each of them having two alternate forms in the third person and middle person.

The vaidika prakaraṇa is followed by the svara prakaraṇa, or the section on accents. It is curious that these rules have not been clubbed with rest of the Vedic Grammar. Here the accents of words, verb-stems or roots and affixes are given, but not the accents of nominal bases. The accents of nominal bases are listed separately under the heading 'Phiṭ Sutras', 'phiṭ' being the technical name for nominal bases.

10.15 Liṅgānuśāsanam

Liṅgānuśāsanam lists 189 sūtras to determine the gender of words. This is different from the nāmaliṅgānuśāsanam of Amar Singh, or amarasiṁha, which is more commonly referred to as amarakośaṁ. The amarakośaṁ is like a thesaurus listing groups of words with similar meanings. Along with the words, the gender is also clarified, where required. The pāṇinīyaliṅgānuśāsanam on the other hand gives rules governing the gender of words. The liṅgānuśāsanam is the first appendix to Siddhāntakaumudi. Some, mainly Western Indologists, opine that this work is not composed by Pāṇini, but the traditional grammarians of India, including Bhattoji Dīkṣita, attribute this work to Pāṇini.

11. Gaṇapāṭha

The second appendix is the gaṇapāṭha. Unlike the liṅgānuśāsanaṁ, the Aṣṭādhyāyī as a book on grammar would be incomplete without the gaṇapāṭha. Many sūtras, as in 'sarvādīni sarvanāmāni' (sarva and others are the pronouns) refer to a class of words known simply by the first word, to which the entire sūtra applies. Since this list of words grouped together is so important, the Siddhāntakaumudi incorporates them into the main text and lists the words wherever a gaṇa is referred to.

The gaṇapāṭha has more than a thousand words listed under 258 gaṇas. Some gaṇas, like the sarva gaṇa mentioned above have further sub-gaṇas which are also referred to separately.

12. Dhātupāṭha

Siddhantakaumudi, S. C. Vasu Madhaviya Dhatuvritti (A. Mahadeva Sastri, 1900) Paniniya Dhatupatha (Sanskrit Documents) Pandit Kanak Lal Sharma's Ashtadhyayi (1969)
Class 1 1059 995 1165 1010
Class 2 72 71 76 72
Class 3 25 24 26 24
Class 4 137 137 161 140
Class 5 34 34 39 34
Class 6 143 153 173 157
Class 7 25 25 25 25
Class 8 10 10 10 10
Class 9 61 60 71 61
Class 10 395 390 489 410
1961 1899 2235 1943
The other important appendix of the Aṣṭādhyāyī is the dhātupāṭha, which lists all the roots or verbal bases. There are different versions of the dhātupāṭha with about 2,000 to 2,200 roots. Sāyaṇa-Mādhava is said to have edited / strengthened this list. A Mādhavīya dhātuvritti is popular. These are listed under ten classes or gaṇas and each gaṇa is known after the first root in the gaṇa as bhvādayaḥ (bhū and others) and so on. Listed in the adjacent table are the numbers of roots in each class, as per different sources. More than the actual number, the pattern of distribution is instructive. We see that more than half the roots are in the first class; three other classes – tenth, fourth and sixth – account for another third of the roots. Thus the remaining six classes account for less than a fifth of the roots. As it turns out the conjugation of verbs in the first class, tenth class, and sixth class are similar with a few changes; those in the fourth class are exactly similar to the conjugation of Atmanepada verbs and the passive verbs. Thus the bulk of conjugations can be learnt by learning two patterns of conjugation.

In the Siddhāntakaumudi, 524 sūtras starting with number 2151 deal with the conjugations and the nearly two thousand roots are listed with meaning under one of the 524 rules. Thus no separate list is appended to the Siddhāntakaumudi, as it is appended to the Aṣṭādhyāyī.

Of these, a beginner can gain a good understanding of the language with knowledge of about 200 to 250 roots.

13. Difficulty in Learning

If is often held that Sanskrit is difficult to learn. This may be on two counts. One, since this is seldom 'picked up', as opposed to being learnt in a formal way, in childhood the difficulty is very apparent. Many people learn other languages as adults; even they seem to find Sanskrit tough. This is so because a certain amount of abstractness is encountered in the initial stages of learning the language, as compared to learning other languages wherein people seem to be making good progress in a short time. Some believe this to be an issue of the teaching methodology and have tried to structure Sanskrit similarly with small phrases being taught so that Sanskrit may be spoken in ten days. Even so the perception about the difficulty persists.

This, in a way, is the price paid for the proximity to perfection that Sanskrit grammar has achieved. Indeed many compare the joys of learning Sanskrit grammar with that from reading Euclid's geometry. The linguists' ideal grammar would identify all the building blocks of a language and the rules governing their combination, like a Chemist has the Periodic Table and the valences of different elements. This grammar would then be able to predict all the possible combinations resulting in words and sentences. Such a grammar is called a Transformational Grammar or a Generative Grammar. There are other such get-to-the-root-of-it grammars. All of them, though purportedly describing English, are as difficult to learn. Thus any grammar which identifies the components at the lowest level is necessarily abstract and difficult to learn in the initial stages. The reward for this difficulty is the ability to generate virtual infinite combinations of these components.

The components are the 2,000 roots and the affixes – tiṅ, krit, sup, taddhita etc.; the Aṣṭādhyāyī sūtras, Māheśvara sūtras, phiṭ sūtras and the uṇādi sūtras are the rules governing the combination of these components. It is best to approach the language with the knowledge that it is an extra-ordinary science and that it requires some amount of effort.

In order to make this effort tolerable, a popular scheme in to first teach basic sandhis, about 20 declensions, and conjugation of the verbs in 1st, 4th, 6th and 10th classes in the present, imperfect and simple future tense and in the potential and imperative moods along with rules of sandhi. After this, participles of the present, potential and past are introduced along with a few secondary affixes (taddhita vritti) and compound words (samāsas). In the process, the student would be acquainted with not a few dhātus.

With this knowledge, one would be able to competently refer to kośas (dictionaries and other compendia) and do some amount of self study. With some practice of doing visandhi, identifying individual words, one can start reading easy texts like Mahabharata, the purāṇas or pañcatantra. Some amount of reading classical literature under a teacher would be useful to tackle works of higher poetic merit like Ramayana, the pañcamahākāvyas (Raghuvaṁśam and Kumārasaṁbhavam of Kālidāsa, Kirātārjunīyam of Bhāravi, Śiśupālavadham of Māgha, and Naiṣadham of Śrīharṣa), and the dramas of poets like Bhāsa, Kālidāsa, Bhavabhūti and Harṣa. Usually this study is taken up along with the study of other aspects of grammar. Prose works are the most difficult to read in Sanskrit as they abound in difficult puns. These are usually taken up for study only after a thorough study of grammar. Technical works on the darśanas or Āyurveda etc. require some amount of initiation into the terminology used therein. With Vedānta, often the difficulty is not with the language, but with the concept.

14. Conclusion

Thus we see that over a few centuries the Vedic language got refined into Sanskrit with a most impressive grammar being evolved in the form of Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī at least two and a half millennia back. It might not be incorrect to say that the grammar of Sanskrit is the oldest, shortest and the best grammar of any language in the world. The ideal of dividing a language into components and rules governing how the components interact with each other has been perhaps achieved best in Sanskrit.

With a little over 2,000 roots and a couple of hundred affixes, governed by about 4,000 rules, Sanskrit grammar can generate millions of words and word forms enough to describe the world, its sciences and developments, thousands of years after the grammar reached its mature form. This generative ability is due to the most fundamental level at which the building blocks of the language have been examined and the relationship amongst them determined. In this sense, comparing other grammars with Sanskrit grammar would be like comparing particle physics with mechanics.

With such extra-ordinary sophistication, perfection really, it is not a wonder that grammar acquired canonical status, and Pāṇini, the equivalent of Sainthood. Great as Pāṇini was, the grammar in its final form is most likely a culmination of the efforts of generations of grammarians over a few centuries. It is equally true, contrary to general perception, that grammar evolved after Pāṇini as well, incrementally in its rules, application and interpretation of rules; and dramatically in pedagogy – method of teaching.

Sanskrit grammar continues to inspire awe and amazement amongst those who study it, as only a work of highest beauty and perfection can. It is not the easiest of grammars to master, but it definitely is amongst the least arbitrary; each rule is almost like a law of nature with any keen and diligent observer coming to a similar conclusion after observing the patterns of speech one encounters. To put the perceived difficulty in learning in perspective, it is most useful to note that this system was devised in an age when writing was not widely prevalent and that more than a hundred generations of scholars learnt it without the kind of learning aids that we today have. How blessed then are we, that we inherited this wonderful science as a heritage and that we have cheap paper, cheap writing instruments, numerous books, computers, the internet, networks of well-meaning individuals, the thousands of centres of learning to pass this on to the next generation?

For further reading, Yudhiṣṭhir Mīmāṁsaka's “Saṁskrit Vyākaraṇ kā itihās” in Hindi is the best work on the history of grammar. Most of the key texts – Aṣṭādhyāyī, Siddhāntakaumudi and the Kāś ikā – have been edited and translated into English with notes by S. C. Vasu; they are the best English versions of the key texts. The Sanskrit – English dictionary by Monier Williams is one of the best (it was written in order to help the translation of Bible into Sanskrit as a Sanskrit Bible was thought the most powerful means of proselytisation) and most comprehensive – (though it A number of Sanskrit documents are available freely and for purchase on the internet. The site Sanskrit Documents (www.sanskritdocuments.org) maintains a most useful and comprehensive list of all the Sanskrit Documents available on the internet. Maharshi University of Management (http://is1.mum.edu/vedicreserve/) has most of the vedic literature in devanāgarī script with the highest quality of editing. The Chitrāpūr Math has one of the best free lessons on Sanskrit (http://www.chitrapurmath.net/sanskrit/sanskrit_Iesson.asp) on the internet. Dr. Shivamurthy Swamiji of Sri Taralabalu Jagadguru Brihanmath, Sirigere, Karnataka has developed an amazing implementation of the Aṣṭādhyāyī, called the gaṇakāṣṭādhyāyī available at http://www.taralabalu.org/panini/. The Digital Library of India (www.new.dli.ernet.in and http://dli.iiit.ac.in) has an invaluable treasure of old books on, in and about Sanskrit. Samskrita Bhārati (http://www.samskritabharati.org/sb) has the most extensive programme of teaching Sanskrit in classrooms.

It is hoped that the above listed aids would be found helpful by the reader. Svasti.