Telugu grammar
Encyclopedia
Telugu grammar is called Vyākaranam .
The first treatise on Telugu grammar, the "Andhra Shabda Chintamani" was written in Sanskrit
by Nannayya
, who was considered first poet and translator of Telugu in the 11th century A.D. There was no grammatical work in telugu prior to Nannayya
's "Andhra sabda chintamani". This grammar followed the patterns which existed in grammatical treatises like Aṣṭādhyāyī and Vālmīkivyākaranam but unlike Pāṇini, Nannayya divided his work into five chapters, covering samjnā
, sandhi
, ajanta
, halanta and kriya
.
After Nannayya, Atharvana and Ahobala composed sutras
, vartikas and bashyam. Like Nannayya, they had previously written their works in Sanskrit.
In the 19th century, Chinnaya Suri wrote a simplified work on Telugu grammar called "Bāla Vyākaranam", borrowing concepts and ideas from Nannayya's Andhra Sabda Chintamani, and wrote his literary work in Telugu.
Every telugu grammatical rule is derived from Pāṇinian, Katyayana
and Patanjali
concepts. However high percentage of Paninian aspects and technics borrowed in Telugu.
According to Nannayya
, language without 'Niyama
' or the language which doesnt adhere to Vyākaranam is called 'Grāmya' or apabhramsa and hence it is unfit for literary usage. All the literary texts in Telugu follows Vyākaranam.
This sentence can also be interpreted as 'Ramu will go to school' depending on the context. But it does not affect the SOV order.
:
In Telugu the suffix - (–Du ) is almost always indicative of masculine gender.
For example:
However, there are more masculine nouns that do not end in (-Du).
For example:
Some masculine nouns ending in (Du) can be converted to feminine nouns by deleting the (–Du) suffix and adding a suffix (-I).
Some Masculine names ending in (Du) can be converted to Feminine names by deleting the
(Du) and adding the suffix, (rAlu).
In Telugu the suffix - (–Mu ) or (-Am) or (-u) is almost always indicative of the neuter gender. For example:
However, Telugu sometimes uses the same forms for singular feminine and neuter genders – the third person pronoun (అది /ad̪ɪ/) is used to refer to animals and objects.
is the fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of sounds due to neighboring sounds or due to the grammatical function of adjacent words.
Telugu uses morphological
processes to join words together, forming complex words. These processes are traditionally referred to as sandhi
Example, Shankara + Abharanam gives the word Shankaraabharanam.
There are many types of Sandhis in telugu. Some of them are mentioned below:
Some of the telugu samasams are:
in Telugu is called 'Chandassu'. Utpalamala, Champakamala, Mattebham, Sardoola, Sragdhara, Bhujangaprayata etc.. are some meters used in Telugu poetry.
In Telugu plural is also used address elders with respect.
For example:
Bhojanam is Prakriti (the noun form of food) and Bonam for Vikruti.
Vidya (Education) is Prakriti and Vidde is Vikruti
Rakshasi (Evil) is Prakriti and Rakkasi is Vikruti.
The first treatise on Telugu grammar, the "Andhra Shabda Chintamani" was written in Sanskrit
Sanskrit
Sanskrit , is a historical Indo-Aryan language and the primary liturgical language of Hinduism, Jainism and Buddhism.Buddhism: besides Pali, see Buddhist Hybrid Sanskrit Today, it is listed as one of the 22 scheduled languages of India and is an official language of the state of Uttarakhand...
by Nannayya
Nannayya
Nannaya Bhattaraka is the earliest known Telugu author, and the author of the first third of the Andhra Mahabharatamu, a Telugu retelling of the Mahabharata. Nannaya is held in high regard as the person who revived the Telugu language...
, who was considered first poet and translator of Telugu in the 11th century A.D. There was no grammatical work in telugu prior to Nannayya
Nannayya
Nannaya Bhattaraka is the earliest known Telugu author, and the author of the first third of the Andhra Mahabharatamu, a Telugu retelling of the Mahabharata. Nannaya is held in high regard as the person who revived the Telugu language...
's "Andhra sabda chintamani". This grammar followed the patterns which existed in grammatical treatises like Aṣṭādhyāyī and Vālmīkivyākaranam but unlike Pāṇini, Nannayya divided his work into five chapters, covering samjnā
Samjna
Saṃjñā and sañña can be translated as "perception" or "cognition."-In the Early Buddhist literature:...
, sandhi
Sandhi
Sandhi is a cover term for a wide variety of phonological processes that occur at morpheme or word boundaries . Examples include the fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of sounds due to neighboring sounds or due to the grammatical function of adjacent words...
, ajanta
Ajanta
The Ajanta Caves in Aurangabad district of Maharashtra, India are 29 rock-cut cave monuments which date from the 2nd century BCE. The caves include paintings and sculptures considered to be masterpieces of both Buddhist religious art as well as frescos which are reminiscent of the Sigiriya...
, halanta and kriya
Kriya
Kriya most commonly refers to a "completed action", technique or practice within a yoga discipline meant to achieve a specific result. Types of kriya may vary widely between different schools of yoga. Another meaning of Kriya is the outward physical manifestations of awakened kundalini...
.
After Nannayya, Atharvana and Ahobala composed sutras
Sutras
Sutras may refer to:*Sūtra - A type of literary composition in Buddhism and Hinduism*Sutras - An album by 1960s rock musician Donovan...
, vartikas and bashyam. Like Nannayya, they had previously written their works in Sanskrit.
In the 19th century, Chinnaya Suri wrote a simplified work on Telugu grammar called "Bāla Vyākaranam", borrowing concepts and ideas from Nannayya's Andhra Sabda Chintamani, and wrote his literary work in Telugu.
Every telugu grammatical rule is derived from Pāṇinian, Katyayana
Katyayana
Kātyāyana was a Sanskrit grammarian, mathematician and Vedic priest who lived in ancient India.-Works:He is known for two works:...
and Patanjali
Patañjali
Patañjali is the compiler of the Yoga Sūtras, an important collection of aphorisms on Yoga practice. According to tradition, the same Patañjali was also the author of the Mahābhāṣya, a commentary on Kātyāyana's vārttikas on Pāṇini's Aṣṭādhyāyī as well as an unspecified work of medicine .In...
concepts. However high percentage of Paninian aspects and technics borrowed in Telugu.
According to Nannayya
Nannayya
Nannaya Bhattaraka is the earliest known Telugu author, and the author of the first third of the Andhra Mahabharatamu, a Telugu retelling of the Mahabharata. Nannaya is held in high regard as the person who revived the Telugu language...
, language without 'Niyama
Niyama
Niyama generally denotes a duty or obligation adopted by a spiritual aspirant , or prescribed by a guru or by scripture...
' or the language which doesnt adhere to Vyākaranam is called 'Grāmya' or apabhramsa and hence it is unfit for literary usage. All the literary texts in Telugu follows Vyākaranam.
Subject-Object-Verb
The primary word order of telugu is SOV (Subject-Object-Verb)| Sentence | రాముడు బడికి వెళ్తాడు. | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Words | రాముడు | బడికి | వెళ్తాడు. |
| Transliteration Transliteration Transliteration is a subset of the science of hermeneutics. It is a form of translation, and is the practice of converting a text from one script into another... |
Ramudu | badiki | veLthaadu |
| Gloss Gloss A gloss is a brief notation of the meaning of a word or wording in a text. It may be in the language of the text, or in the reader's language if that is different.... |
Ramu | to school | goes. |
| Parts | Subject | Object | Verb |
| Translation | Ramu goes to school. | ||
This sentence can also be interpreted as 'Ramu will go to school' depending on the context. But it does not affect the SOV order.
Inflection
Telugu is more inflected than the other literary Dravidian languages. Telugu nouns are inflected for number (singular, plural), gender (masculine, feminine, and neuter) and case (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, vocative, instrumental, and locative).Gender
Telugu has three gendersGrammatical gender
Grammatical gender is defined linguistically as a system of classes of nouns which trigger specific types of inflections in associated words, such as adjectives, verbs and others. For a system of noun classes to be a gender system, every noun must belong to one of the classes and there should be...
:
- masculine (purusha liṃgam),
- feminine (strī liṃgam), and
- neuter (napuṃsaka liṃgam).
In Telugu the suffix - (–Du ) is almost always indicative of masculine gender.
For example:
- ta-mmu-Du (younger brother),
- mu-khyu-Du (important man),
- Ramu-Du (Ramu),
- nA-ya-ku-Du (leader).
However, there are more masculine nouns that do not end in (-Du).
For example:
- a-nna (elder brother),
- mA-ma (uncle).
Some masculine nouns ending in (Du) can be converted to feminine nouns by deleting the (–Du) suffix and adding a suffix (-I).
| Masculine | Feminine |
|---|---|
| na-rta-ku-Du (dancer) | na-rta-ki (dancer) |
| vA-cha-ku-Du (narrator) | vA-cha-ki (narrator) |
| pre-mi-ku-Du (lover) | pre-ya-si (lover) |
Some Masculine names ending in (Du) can be converted to Feminine names by deleting the
(Du) and adding the suffix, (rAlu).
| Masculine | Feminine |
|---|---|
| na-rta-ku-Du (dancer) | na-rta-ku-rA-lu (dancer) |
| pri-yu-Du (lover) | pri-yu-rA-lu (lover) |
| bha-ktu-Du (male devote) | bha-ktu-rA-lu (female devotee) |
In Telugu the suffix - (–Mu ) or (-Am) or (-u) is almost always indicative of the neuter gender. For example:
- Chitra Pata-mu or Chitra Pat-am (Photo Frame),
- Chitra-mu or Chitr-am (Picture/Photo)
- Akash-am or Akasha-mu (sky),
- Neer-u (Water),
- Parikar-am or Parikara-mu (Tool).
However, Telugu sometimes uses the same forms for singular feminine and neuter genders – the third person pronoun (అది /ad̪ɪ/) is used to refer to animals and objects.
Pronouns
Telugu pronouns include- Personal pronouns and Demonstrative pronouns(The persons speaking, the persons spoken to, or the persons or things spoken about).
- Reflexive pronouns (in which the object of a verb is being acted on by verb's subject).
- Interrogative Pronoun.
- Indefinite pronoun.
- Demonstrative adjective and Interrogative adjective Pronouns.
- Possessive adjective Pronouns.
- Pronouns referring to numbers.
- Distributive Pronouns.
Postpositions
Telugu language uses postpositions instead of prepositions unlike in English. With the use of postpositions, there are eight cases (vibhakti విభక్తి) like in Sanskrit, however the cases are somewhat different from those in Sanskrit.| Telugu | English | Significance | Usual Suffixes |
|---|---|---|---|
| First case | Nominative Nominative case The nominative case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or the predicate noun or predicate adjective, as opposed to its object or other verb arguments... |
Subject of sentence | డు, ము, వు, లు |
| Second case | Accusative Accusative case The accusative case of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of prepositions... |
Object of action | నిన్, నున్, లన్, కూర్చి, గురించి |
| Third case | Instrumental Instrumental case The instrumental case is a grammatical case used to indicate that a noun is the instrument or means by or with which the subject achieves or accomplishes an action... , Social |
Means by which action is done (Instrumental), Association, or means by which action is done (Social) | చేతన్, చేన్, తోడన్, తోన్ |
| Fourth case | Dative Dative case The dative case is a grammatical case generally used to indicate the noun to whom something is given, as in "George gave Jamie a drink".... |
Object to whom action is performed, Object for whom action is performed | కొఱకున్, కై |
| Fifth case | Ablative Ablative case In linguistics, ablative case is a name given to cases in various languages whose common characteristic is that they mark motion away from something, though the details in each language may differ... of motion from |
Motion from an animate/inanimate object | వలనన్, కంటెన్, పట్టి |
| Sixth case | Genitive Genitive case In grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun... |
Possessive | కిన్, కున్, యొక్క, లోన్, లోపలన్ |
| Seventh case | Locative Locative case Locative is a grammatical case which indicates a location. It corresponds vaguely to the English prepositions "in", "on", "at", and "by"... |
Place in which, On the person of (animate) in the presence of | అందున్, నన్ |
| Eighth case | Vocative Vocative case The vocative case is the case used for a noun identifying the person being addressed and/or occasionally the determiners of that noun. A vocative expression is an expression of direct address, wherein the identity of the party being spoken to is set forth expressly within a sentence... |
Addressing, calling | ఓ, ఓయి, ఓరి, ఓసి |
Punctuation
Telugu uses single and double vertical bars to indicate a comma and a fullstop. However modern Telugu uses punctuation marks which are borrowed from English.Sandhi or Joining
SandhiSandhi
Sandhi is a cover term for a wide variety of phonological processes that occur at morpheme or word boundaries . Examples include the fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of sounds due to neighboring sounds or due to the grammatical function of adjacent words...
is the fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of sounds due to neighboring sounds or due to the grammatical function of adjacent words.
Telugu uses morphological
Morphology (linguistics)
In linguistics, morphology is the identification, analysis and description, in a language, of the structure of morphemes and other linguistic units, such as words, affixes, parts of speech, intonation/stress, or implied context...
processes to join words together, forming complex words. These processes are traditionally referred to as sandhi
Sandhi
Sandhi is a cover term for a wide variety of phonological processes that occur at morpheme or word boundaries . Examples include the fusion of sounds across word boundaries and the alteration of sounds due to neighboring sounds or due to the grammatical function of adjacent words...
Example, Shankara + Abharanam gives the word Shankaraabharanam.
There are many types of Sandhis in telugu. Some of them are mentioned below:
- Savarna Dheerga Sandhi.
- Guna Sandhi.
- Vriddhi Sandhi.
- Yanadesa Sandhi.
- Trika Sandhi.
- Akara Sandhi.
- Ukara sandhi.
- Ikara Sandhi.
- Dugagama Sandhi.
- Saraladesha Sandhi
- Gasadadavadesha Sandhi.
- Rugagama Sandhi.
- Yadagama Sandhi.
- Pradhametara Vibhakti Sandhi.
Samasam or nominal compounds
Samasam or Samasa occurs with various structures, but morphologically speaking they are essentially the same: each noun (or adjective) is in its (weak) stem form, with only the final element receiving case inflection.Some of the telugu samasams are:
- TatpuruṣaTatpurusaIn Sanskrit grammar a ' compound is a dependent determinative compound, i.e. a compound XY meaning a type of Y which is related to X in a way corresponding to one of the grammatical cases of X....
Samasam. - Karmadhāraya Samasam.
- Dvigu Samasam.
- DvandvaDvandvaA dvandva or twin or Siamese compound refers to one or more objects that could be connected in sense by the conjunction 'and', where the objects refer to the parts of an agglomeration described by the compound...
Samasam. - BahuvrīhiBahuvrihiA bahuvrihi compound is a type of compound that denotes a referent by specifying a certain characteristic or quality the referent possesses. A bahuvrihi is exocentric, so that the compound is not a hyponym of its head...
Samasam. - Amredita samasam.
Alankaram or Ornamentation
Telugu Alankaram is a figure of speech which means ornaments or embellishments which are used to enhance the beauty of the poems. There are two types of Alankarams, 'Shabdalankaram' which primarily focuses on Sound and 'Arthalamkaram' which focuses on meaning. These two alankarams are further broken down in to different categories.- Shabdalankaram
- Vruttyanuprasa
- Chekanuprasa
- Latanuprasa
- Yamakam
- Arthalamkaram
- Upamanaalankaram
- Uthprekshaalankaram
- Rupakaalankaram
- Shleshalankaram
- Arthantaranyaasam
- Atishayokti
- Drushthantam
- Swabhavokti
Chandassu or Telugu Prosody
Metrical poetryMeter (poetry)
In poetry, metre is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse metre, or a certain set of metres alternating in a particular order. The study of metres and forms of versification is known as prosody...
in Telugu is called 'Chandassu'. Utpalamala, Champakamala, Mattebham, Sardoola, Sragdhara, Bhujangaprayata etc.. are some meters used in Telugu poetry.
Vachanam or Grammatical numbers
In Telugu, Singular is Called Eka-Vachanam (Ex: Nuvvu - you) and Plural is called Bahu-Vachanam (Ex: Manam - we).In Telugu plural is also used address elders with respect.
Prakriti and Vikriti
Telugu has many Tatsama words. They are called Prakriti which are equivalent to Sanskrit words. The equivalent colloquial words are called Vikrutis. Vikruti means distorted. However Prakriti is only used as medium of instruction in educational institutions, offices etc..For example:
Bhojanam is Prakriti (the noun form of food) and Bonam for Vikruti.
Vidya (Education) is Prakriti and Vidde is Vikruti
Rakshasi (Evil) is Prakriti and Rakkasi is Vikruti.
See also
- Telugu languageTelugu languageTelugu is a Central Dravidian language primarily spoken in the state of Andhra Pradesh, India, where it is an official language. It is also spoken in the neighbouring states of Chattisgarh, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Orissa and Tamil Nadu...
- Telugu literatureTelugu literatureThe Telugu literature or Telugu Sahityam is one of the most precious possessions of the literary products of India. Telugu literature is rich reserve of poems, stories, dramas and puranas. It flowered in the early 16th century under the Vijayanagar empire, of which Telugu was one of the court...
- Telugu peopleTelugu peopleThe Telugu people or Telugu Prajalu are an ethnic group of India. They are the native speakers of the Telugu language, the most commonly spoken language in India after Hindi and Bengali...
- Satavahana Dynasty
- Sanskrit grammarSanskrit grammarThe grammar of the Sanskrit language has a complex verbal system, rich nominal declension, and extensive use of compound nouns. It was studied and codified by Sanskrit grammarians from the later Vedic period , culminating in the Pāṇinian grammar of the 4th century BC.-Grammatical tradition:The...
- Sanskrit pronouns and determinersSanskrit pronouns and determinersSanskrit pronouns are declined for case, number, and gender. The pronominal declension applies to a few adjectives as well.Many pronouns have alternative enclitic forms.-First- and second-person persons:...