The grammar of the Marathi language shares similarities with other modern Indo-Aryan languages such as

Odia Odia, also spelled Oriya or Odiya, may refer to: * Odia people in Odisha, India * Odia language, an Indian language, belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European language family * Odia alphabet, a writing system used for the Odia languag ...

Gujarati Gujarati may refer to: * something of, from, or related to Gujarat, a state of India * Gujarati people, the major ethnic group of Gujarat * Gujarati language, the Indo-Aryan language spoken by them * Gujarati languages, the Western Indo-Aryan sub- ...

Punjabi Punjabi, or Panjabi, most often refers to: * Something of, from, or related to Punjab, a region in India and Pakistan * Punjabi language * Punjabi people * Punjabi dialects and languages Punjabi may also refer to: * Punjabi (horse), a British Th ...

. The first modern book exclusively about the grammar of Marathi was printed in 1805 by Willam Carey. The principal word order in Marathi is SOV (subject–object–verb). Nouns

inflect In linguistic morphology, inflection (or inflexion) is a process of word formation in which a word is modified to express different grammatical categories such as tense, case, voice, aspect, person, number, gender, mood, animacy, and defi ...

for gender (masculine, feminine, neuter), number (singular, plural), and

case Case or CASE may refer to: Containers * Case (goods), a package of related merchandise * Cartridge case or casing, a firearm cartridge component * Bookcase, a piece of furniture used to store books * Briefcase or attaché case, a narrow box to ca ...

. Marathi preserves the

neuter gender In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...

found in Sanskrit, a feature further distinguishing it from many Indo-Aryan languages. Typically, Marathi adjectives do not inflect unless they end in an () vowel, in which case they inflect for gender and number. Marathi verbs

for tense (past, present, future). Verbs can agree with their subjects, yielding an active voice construction, or with their objects, yielding a passive voice construction. A third type of voice, not found in English for example, is produced when the verb agrees with neither subject nor object. Affixation is largely suffixal in the language and postpositions are attested. An unusual feature of Marathi, as compared to other Indo-European languages, is that it displays the inclusive and exclusive we feature, that is common to the Dravidian languages, Rajasthani, and

. The contemporary grammatical rules described by

Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad Maharashtra Sahitya Parishad is a literary institution situated in the Indian state of Maharashtra for the purpose of the "furtherance of Marathi language and literature". It was established in Pune in 1906. ''The Encyclopedia of Indian Literatur ...

and endorsed by the

Government of Maharashtra The Government of Maharashtra is the state governing authority for the state of Maharashtra, India. It is a democratically elected government with 288 MLAs elected to the Vidhan Sabha for a five-year term. Maharashtra has a Maharashtra Legis ...

are supposed to take precedence in standard written Marathi. These rules are described in ''Marathi Grammar'', written by M. R. Walimbe. The book is widely referred to students in schools and colleges.

Sanskrit influence

Traditions of Marathi Linguistics and above mentioned rules give special status to ‘ tatsama’ (तत्सम) words borrowed from the Sanskrit language. This special status expects the rules for ‘tatsama’ words be followed as of Sanskrit grammar.

Parts of speech

Marathi words can be classified in any of the following

parts of speech In grammar, a part of speech or part-of-speech (abbreviated as POS or PoS, also known as word class or grammatical category) is a category of words (or, more generally, of lexical items) that have similar grammatical properties. Words that are as ...

Nominals

Nouns are primarily divided into three categories – proper nouns (विशेषनाम, ''visheshnāma''), common nouns (सामान्यनाम, ''samānyanāma''), and abstract nouns (भाववाचकनाम, ''bhāvvāchaknāma'') – that are identical in definition to their counterparts in other languages (such as English), and are inflected for gender, number and case. They are also often categorized based on their ending vowel, which is especially useful in studying their inflection – those ending in the schwa (or inherent vowel) ''a'' (अ) are termed ''akārānt ''(अकारान्त), those ending in the vowel ''ā'' (आ) are termed ''ākārānt ''(आकारान्त), those ending in the vowel ''ī ''(ई) are termed ''īkārānt ''(ईकारान्त), and so on.

Gender

There are three genders in Marathi: masculine, feminine, and neuter. Some other modern Indo-European languages have lost these genders, completely, as in English and Persian, or in part, with either neuter and common gender (merging masculine and feminine), as in some Northern Germanic languages, or feminine and masculine (absorbing neuter), as in almost all Romance languages. While there exists no concrete rules for determining the gender of a given noun, certain observations do help speakers in that regard: masculine nouns can only be ''akārānt ''or ''ākārānt, ''while neuter nouns can only be ''akārānt, īkārānt, ukārānt ''(उकारान्त, ending in ''u'')'', ''or ''ekārānt ''(एकारान्त, ending in ''e'')''.'' The grammatical gender of common nouns referring to animated objects corresponds to their natural sex – for example, ''mulgā'' (मुलगा, 'boy') is a masculine noun, whereas ''mulgī'' (मुलगी, 'girl') is a feminine one. Given the masculine forms of such nouns, the feminine noun can often be determined using a set of rules: * Some ''ākārānt ''nouns have corresponding feminine forms as ''īkārānt ''with the same root – ''mulgā/mulgī'' (boy/girl), ''kutrā/kutrī'' (dog/bitch)'', ghoḍā/ghoḍī'' (horse/mare). * Some ''akārānt ''nouns also have their corresponding feminine forms as ''īkārānt ''with the same root – ''hansa/hansī'' (male and female swans), ''vānar/vānrī'' (male and female monkeys). * Some nouns use the suffix ''-īṇ'' (ईण) to form their feminine forms – ''vāgha/vāghīṇ'' (tiger/tigress), ''mālaka/mālakīṇ'' (male and female owners). * Some nouns have their feminine forms made out of entirely different words – ''navrā/bāyko'' (husband/wife), ''bāp/āī'' (father/mother), ''rājā/rāṇī'' (king/queen). Similarly, for masculine ''ākārānt ''common nouns referring to inanimate objects, the 'diminutive' (लघुत्वदर्शक, ''lughatvadarshak'') forms are feminine, and are ''īkārānt – danḍā/danḍī ''(big/small stick)'', loṭā/loṭī ''(big/small mug)''.''

Case

There are differences of opinion regarding grammatical cases in Marathi. According to one view, there are two cases: direct, which is unmarked (e.g. Ram 'Ram') and

oblique Oblique may refer to: * an alternative name for the character usually called a slash (punctuation) ( / ) * Oblique angle, in geometry * Oblique triangle, in geometry *Oblique lattice, in geometry * Oblique leaf base, a characteristic shape of the ...

, which is used before adpositions (e.g. ' 'to Ram', ''-a'' being the oblique case marker and ''-la'' the dative adposition) and postpositions (e.g. ' 'from Ram',''-a'' being the oblique case marker and ''-pasun'' the postposition). The form of the oblique suffix depends on the gender and the final vowel of the word it is suffixed to. According to this analysis, true postpositions (like ' 'from') have a wide range of meanings and can be separated form the noun by

clitic In morphology and syntax, a clitic (, backformed from Greek "leaning" or "enclitic"Crystal, David. ''A First Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics''. Boulder, CO: Westview, 1980. Print.) is a morpheme that has syntactic characteristics of a wo ...

s like ' (e.g. '). Adpositions (like ''-la''), on the other hand, are only used to mark nominal

arguments An argument is a statement or group of statements called premises intended to determine the degree of truth or acceptability of another statement called conclusion. Arguments can be studied from three main perspectives: the logical, the dialectic ...

of the verb in terms of their

theta role In generative grammar, a theta role or θ-role is the formal device for representing syntactic argument structure—the number and type of noun phrases—required syntactically by a particular verb. For example, the verb ''put'' requires three a ...

s and cannot be separated from the noun by clitics (''*'' is ungrammatical). Syntactically, the latter behave the same as case markers corresponding to the traditional grammar. In this view, the cases are: nominative (unmarked),

accusative The accusative case ( abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: 'me,' 'him,' 'her,' 'us,' and ‘th ...

/ dative (singular ''-la'', plural ''-na''), ergative, which is traditionally called 'instrumental' (sg. ''-ne'', pl. ''-ni'') and genitive/possessive (', ', ', '). The class of true postpositions will then include ''-hatun'' 'through', ''-hu(n)'' 'from'/

ablative In grammar, the ablative case (pronounced ; sometimes abbreviated ) is a grammatical case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the grammars of various languages; it is sometimes used to express motion away from something, among other uses. T ...

, ''-t''

locative In grammar, the locative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which indicates a location. It corresponds vaguely to the English prepositions "in", "on", "at", and "by". The locative case belongs to the general local cases, together with the ...

, ''-jagi'' 'in place of' and many more. The genitive markers inflect to agree with the governing noun.

Traditional grammar

In traditional analyses which follow the pattern of Sanskrit grammatical tradition, case suffixes are referred to as (''vibhaktī pratyaya'') विभक्ती प्रत्यय. There are eight such (''vibhaktī'') विभक्ती ('
विभक्ती
'') in Marathi. The form of the original word changes when such a suffix is to be attached to the word, and the new, modified root is referred to as ''saamaanya ruup'' of the original word. For example, the word (''ghodā'') घोडा (“horse”) gets transformed into (''ghodyā-'') घोड्या- when the suffix (''-var'') वर- (“on”) is attached to it to form (''ghodyāvar'') घोड्यावर (“on the horse”). The nominal suffixes are tabulated below.

= Split Ergativity

= Marathi is considered a

split ergative In linguistic typology, split ergativity is a feature of certain languages where some constructions use ergative syntax and morphology, but other constructions show another pattern, usually nominative–accusative. The conditions in which ergati ...

language, i.e. it uses both nominative-accusative and ergative-absolutive alignment. In the latter type, the subject of a transitive verb takes the ergative marking (identical to that of the

instrumental case In grammar, the instrumental case (abbreviated or ) 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. The noun may be either a physical object or an ...

) instead of having the same form as the subject of an intransitive verb. This change also results in the verb agreeing with the unmarked noun (usually the object) instead of its subject, as it would in nominative-accusative situations: Note that it is possible for the unmarked noun to be a direct object despite Marathi having an accusative case: Marathi exhibits

Differential object marking In linguistics, differential object marking (DOM) is the phenomenon in which certain objects of verbs are marked to reflect various syntactic and semantic factors. One form of the more general phenomenon of differential argument marking, DOM is p ...

for direct objects, and the accusative declension is used in the case of definite or animate objects. In case there is no unmarked noun, the verb shows neutral agreement: As in many Indo-Aryan languages, the ergative split in Marathi is primarily aspect-based, specifically triggered by the

perfective The perfective aspect (abbreviated ), sometimes called the aoristic aspect, is a grammatical aspect that describes an action viewed as a simple whole; i.e., a unit without interior composition. The perfective aspect is distinguished from the im ...

for transitive verbs, as seen in the examples above. Furthermore, subjects of intransitive verbs in the obligative subjunctive mood are also marked as ergative, as are third-person subjects in the

optative The optative mood ( or ; abbreviated ) is a grammatical mood that indicates a wish or hope regarding a given action. It is a superset of the cohortative mood and is closely related to the subjunctive mood but is distinct from the desiderative mood ...

= Differential object marking

= Marathi, like many Indo-Aryan languages, exhibits

differential object marking In linguistics, differential object marking (DOM) is the phenomenon in which certain objects of verbs are marked to reflect various syntactic and semantic factors. One form of the more general phenomenon of differential argument marking, DOM is p ...

Direct object In linguistics, an object is any of several types of arguments. In subject-prominent, nominative-accusative languages such as English, a transitive verb typically distinguishes between its subject and any of its objects, which can include b ...

s are marked according to

definiteness In linguistics, definiteness is a semantic feature of noun phrases, distinguishing between referents or senses that are identifiable in a given context (definite noun phrases) and those which are not (indefinite noun phrases). The prototypical ...

, with unmarked objects representing indefinite nouns. As such,

accusative case The accusative case ( abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: 'me,' 'him,' 'her,' 'us,' and ‘th ...

markings are not universally required. Sentences with both unmarked

direct object In linguistics, an object is any of several types of arguments. In subject-prominent, nominative-accusative languages such as English, a transitive verb typically distinguishes between its subject and any of its objects, which can include b ...

s and unmarked subjects must follow the unmarked SOV word order. Since the

nominative case In grammar, the nominative case (abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or (in Latin and formal variants of Engl ...

is typically unmarked, the only time this does not occur is when the subject is a pronoun or in the ergative case, allowing for the usage of marked word orders for emphasis: An alternate analysis of this situation is that Marathi does not mark the

at all, rather the -ला marker is shared between the

dative case In grammar, the dative case (abbreviated , or sometimes when it is a core argument) is a grammatical case used in some languages to indicate the recipient or beneficiary of an action, as in "Maria Jacobo potum dedit", Latin for "Maria gave Jacob ...

and definite

Adjectives

Adjectives typically precede the noun (although in adjective phrases they can follow the noun) and are divided into declinable and indeclinable categories. Declinable adjectives end in the vowel -''ā'' (आ) and must be declined for the gender, number and case of the nouns they qualify. Declining adjectives for case is easier compared to declining nouns, since a single ending applies to all cases; a complete table listing the different endings is given below, with the masculine nominative singular as the

citation form In morphology and lexicography, a lemma (plural ''lemmas'' or ''lemmata'') is the canonical form, dictionary form, or citation form of a set of word forms. In English, for example, ''break'', ''breaks'', ''broke'', ''broken'' and ''breaking'' ...

Possessive

Possessive adjectives in Marathi are slight modifications to the personal pronouns, suffixed with the genitive/possessive case markers – चा/ची/चे (''cā/cī/ce'')'','' for masculine, feminine and plural subjects respectively. However, in the first and second-person singular the case marking is different, as shown below. Possessive adjectives agree in gender and number with the noun they modify; for plural nouns, the markers change from चा/ची/चे to चे/च्या/ची (''ce/cyā/cī''), with a similar transformation for the first and second-person singular adjectives.

Demonstrative

The adjectives हा (''hā'', this) and तो (''to'', that) serve as demonstrative adjectives and are always declined for the gender and number of the noun(s) that follows them.

Pronouns

There are three

grammatical person In linguistics, grammatical person is the grammatical distinction between deictic references to participant(s) in an event; typically the distinction is between the speaker ( first person), the addressee ( second person), and others (third pers ...

s (पुरुष ''purushh'') in Marathi. There is gender distinction in the first- and second-persons when the pronouns act as

agreement Agreement may refer to: Agreements between people and organizations * Gentlemen's agreement, not enforceable by law * Trade agreement, between countries * Consensus, a decision-making process * Contract, enforceable in a court of law ** Meeting ...

markers on verbs; as independent pronouns this distinction in lost.Bhat, D.N.S. 2004. ''Pronouns.'' Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 18–19

Verbs

Verb stems can end in a vowel (''ākārānt, īkārānt, ''or ''ekārānt'') or a consonant (a''kārānt'') and are declined for person, gender and number. They are usually listed in dictionaries in their infinitive forms, which consist of the verb stem with the suffix – ''ṇe'' (णे); for example खाणे (''khāṇē'', to eat), बोलणे (''bolaṇē'', to speak), चालणे (''cālaṇē'', to walk). Verbs are fairly regular, although the copula and other auxiliaries are notable exceptions. The verbal system, much like in other Indo-Aryan languages, revolves around a combination of

aspect Aspect or Aspects may refer to: Entertainment * ''Aspect magazine'', a biannual DVD magazine showcasing new media art * Aspect Co., a Japanese video game company * Aspects (band), a hip hop group from Bristol, England * ''Aspects'' (Benny Carter ...

and tense – there are 3 main aspects (perfect, imperfect, and habitual) and 3 main tenses (present, past, and future). Tenses are marked using conjugations, while aspects are marked using suffixes and by adding conjugations of a copula/auxiliary verb.

Copula

The verb असणे (''asṇē'', to be) is an irregular verb that acts as the copula / auxiliary for all tenses and for the perfect and imperfect aspects; its conjugations are shown below. The habitual aspect uses a different set of conjugations of the same auxiliary verb (असणे); for present-tense and past-tense these conjugations are shown below. In future tense a different auxiliary verb, जाणे (''jāṇē,'' to go), is typically used.

Causatives

Causatives are created from existing verb stems and typically follow the set of patterns listed below. * Attaching 'व' (''v'') to the stem of the verb; in modern literature 'व' is often replaced by 'वि' (''vi''). So हसणे (''hasaṇē'', to laugh) → हसवणे/हसविणे (''hasavṇē/hasviṇē'', to cause to laugh); चालणे (''cālaṇē'', to walk) → चालवणे/चालविणे (''cālavṇē''/''cālviṇē,'' to cause to walk). ** For verbs with stems that have single syllables (खा, घे, दे; ''khā, ghē, dē''), attach 'ववि' (''vavi'') instead of 'व'. Thus, खाणे (''khāṇē'', to eat) → खावविणे (''khāvaviṇē,'' to cause to eat); देणे (''dēṇē,'' to give) → देवविणे (''dēvaviṇē,'' to cause to give). * Root vowel change: ''a'' → ''ā'' (अ → आ), ''u/ū'' → ''o'' (उ/ऊ → ओ), ''i/ī'' → ''e'' (इ/ई → ए); sometimes also accompanied by the root final consonant change 'ṭ' → 'ṛ' (ट → ड). So तुटणे (''tuṭaṇē'', to be broken) → तोडणे (''toṛaṇē'', to cause to broken/to break); गळणे (''gaḷaṇē'', to be buried) → गाळणे (''gāḷaṇē'', to cause to be buried/to bury).

Imperatives

The imperative form of a verb (called आज्ञार्थ, ''ādñārtha'') is formed by applying a simple set of rules to the stem of the verb, and has second-person singular (where there is a distinction between formal and informal) and second-person plural forms (which are the same as the second-person singular formal). * For ''akārānt ''verbs, the informal imperative form is the verb stem itself. The formal imperative is formed by utilizing the transformation ''a'' → ''ā'' (अ → आ) to the stem vowel. * For ''ākārānt ''verbs, the imperative form (formal and informal) is the verb stem itself. * For ''īkārānt ''and ''ekārānt ''verbs, the informal imperative is the verb stem itself. The formal imperative is formed by transforming the final vowel to the semi-vowel या (''yā''). * Negative imperative forms are constructed by adding the suffix -ऊ (''ū'') to the verb stem, and then by adding a separate negative particle नकोस/नको (''nakosa/nako'', for informal imperative) or नका (''nakā'', for formal imperative).

Voice

Traditional grammar distinguishes three grammatical voices (प्रयोग, ''prayog'') in Marathi. *

Active voice Active voice is a grammatical voice common in many of the world's languages. It is the unmarked voice for clauses featuring a transitive verb in nominative–accusative languages, including English and most other Indo-European languages. A verb ...

(कर्तरी प्रयोग ''kartrī prayog'') refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the subject *

Passive voice A passive voice construction is a grammatical voice construction that is found in many languages. In a clause with passive voice, the grammatical subject expresses the ''theme'' or '' patient'' of the main verb – that is, the person or thing ...

(कर्मणी प्रयोग ''karmanī prayog'') refers to a sentence construction in which the verb changes according to the object * Bhāve prayog (भावे प्रयोग) refers to a sentence construction in which the verb does not change according to either the subject or the object. This is used for imperatives.

Sentence structure

A Marathi sentence generally has three parts: subject (कर्ता ''kartā''), object'' ''(कर्म ''karma''), and'' ''verb (क्रियापद ''kriyāpad''). In a Marathi sentence, the subject comes first, then the object, and finally the verb. However, in some sentences there is no object. See also: * Marathi language

References

Bibliography

External links

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