Declension is the addition to the Noun stems of suffixes which indicate grammatical information, such as: case, number & gender. In this post we're going to look at different ways to identify these suffixes. I haven’t found a simple way of achieving this. (But that's part of the fun). As a result I tend to use a combination of tools and methods. However the arrival of the Digital Pāḷi Dictionary (DPD) has made this much easier. Anyway check out my 5 ways to analyse an inflected Pali word.
- Rote table look-up
- Search the Dictionary
- SuttaCentral
- Use a Reader's in-built Dictionary
- The Digital Pāḷi Dictionary
Noun stems in Pāli are regularly grouped into two divisions, those that end in:
- Vowels: -a, -ā, -i, -ī, -u, -ū, (o)
- Consonants, -ar, -ī/in, -an, -at/ant, -as & -us
By far the most end in vowels I'm going to concentrate on these, in this post although the methods below encompass them all.
1 Rote table look-up
The tradition method of teaching Pali, like that of Latin, is to begin with a stem (as found in the dictionary) and then add endings to form the required word. As a classical language, the student is usually presented with lots of grammatical tables to memorise.
To apply any declension we have to know the word’s gender (masculine, neuter or feminine), and this can be found from the dictionary.| stem: | end in: |
|---|---|
| masculine: | a, i, ī, u, ū |
| neuter: | a, i, u |
| feminine | ā, i, ī, u, ū |
These are then often grouped into three declensions (the feminine ā stem grouped with the masculine):
- nouns ending in -a or -ā;
- nouns ending in -i or -ī;
- nouns ending in -u or –ū.
There are many Pali primer & grammar guides which contain table after table detailing the composition of these case suffixes. Knowing some rules of sandhi will help with this process as sometimes vowels become hardened or lengthen in the process of joining suffixes to stems. Below is an interactive table listing these declensions. Just hover over the sgl/pl. to display the required table.
| SINGULAR | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| a, ā | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine |
| Nominative | -o | -aṃ | -ā |
| Accusative | -aṃ | -aṃ | |
| Genitive | -assa | -āya | |
| Dative | -assa -āya |
-āya | |
| Instrumental | -ena | -āya | |
| Ablative | -ā -asmā -amhā -ato |
-āya | |
| Locative | -e -asmiṃ -amhi |
-āya -āyaṃ |
|
| PLURAL | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| a, ā | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine |
| Nominative | -ā | -ā -āni |
-ā -āyo |
| Accusative | -e | -e -āni |
-ā -āyo |
| Genitive (Dative) |
-ānaṃ | -ānaṃ | |
| Instrumental | -ehi -ebhi |
-āhi -ābhi |
|
| Ablative | -ehi -ebhi |
-āhi -ābhi |
|
| Locative | -esu | -āsu | |
| SINGULAR | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| i, ī | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine | ||
| Nominative | -i | -ī | -i -iṃ |
-i | -ī |
| Accusative | -iṃ | -iṃ -inaṃ |
-iṃ | -iṃ | |
| Genitive (Dative) |
-issa -ino |
-iyā | |||
| Instrumental | -inā | -iyā | |||
| Ablative | -inā -ismā -imhā |
-iyā | |||
| Locative | -ismiṃ -imhi |
-iyā -iyaṃ |
|||
| PLURAL | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| i, ī | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine | ||
| Nominative | -i -iyo -ayo |
-ī -ino |
-ī -īni |
-ī -iyo |
|
| Accusative | -ī -iyo -ayo |
-ī -ino |
-ī -īni |
-ī -iyo |
|
| Genitive (Dative) |
-īnaṃ | ||||
| Instrumental | -īhi -ībhi |
||||
| Ablative | -īhi -ībhi |
||||
| Locative | -īsu | ||||
| SINGULAR | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| u, ū | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine | ||
| Nominative | -u | -ū | -u -uṃ |
-u | -ū |
| Accusative | -uṃ | -uṃ | |||
| Genitive (Dative) |
-ussa -uno |
-uyā | |||
| Instrumental | -unā | -uyā | |||
| Ablative | -unā -usmā -umhā |
-uyā | |||
| Locative | -usmiṃ -umhi |
-uyā -uyaṃ |
|||
| PLURAL | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| u, ū | Masculine | Neuter | Feminine | ||
| Nominative | -ū -avo |
-ū -uvo |
-ū -ūni |
-ū -uyo |
|
| Vocative | -ū -avo |
-ū -uvo |
-ū -ūni |
-ū -uyo |
|
| Accusative | -ū -avo |
-ū -uvo |
-ū -ūni |
-ū -uyo |
|
| Genitive (Dative) |
-ūnaṃ | ||||
| Instrumental | -ūhi | ||||
| -ūbhi | |||||
| Ablative | -ūhi | ||||
| -ūbhi | |||||
| Locative | -ūsu | ||||
- Learning tables by heart is time-consuming and boring. It is much better to understand how to use them. Which is why this blog primarily focuses on understanding how Pāli works.
- The fundamental assumption is that the student is attempting to generate Pali (speak or write it). Whereas most students are actually trying to decipher and read the existing texts.
- For translation, what we want is the exact opposite - given a Pali word, we need to dissect out the suffix from the stem; then determine the gender, case, and number that the suffix indicates.
2 Search the Dictionary
Several dictionaries, available online, now have search functions. For instance the PED. As, many of the entries in the PED list inflected forms, it's possible to search for the full word. However many entries don't! So this method is a little hit and miss. But often it's worth a go.
The major drawback to searching the PED is the formatting of the entries, (e.g. bhikkhunaŋ) which I have outlined in a post about using the PED.
But you can always use my converter app to re-format any Pali word for look-up in the Pali-English Dictionary (PED). Just cut & paste your word into to the input box, hit convert and your word will be regenerate to the PED format. It even produces links to any entries found!…
3 SuttaCentral
If you are using SuttaCentral as a source, then it has an in built Pali word lookup feature. Simple use the drop-down menu, under 'view' to 'Activate Pali word lookup'. Then if you double click on a word, this app analyses the Pali text and attempts to display the word meaning. Note it is an aid only, and is not always accurate. Word meanings are from the New Concise Pali English Dictionary. But it can be useful to identify the stem of the word you are interested in.
4 Use a Reader's in-built Dictionary
Similar to using SuttaCentral if you are using either the Digital Pali Reader online or you have downloaded the Tipitaka Pali Projector, both have in built dictionaries that can be searched. Neither are fool-proof - they both identified the stem 'bhikkhu' but fail to find the shortened declension of bhikkhūnaṃ => bhikkhunaṃ. However, they are very useful when parsing compound words in Pali. For help installing etc, both have YouTube pages. DPR help page; and the TPP youtube channel... If you click on a Pali word, both apps will do their best to find the stem in their dictionaries. The TPP contains several. The DPR also provides a drop down box of alternatives if the term is a possible compound. Once the stem is identified, if you click on the c symbol at the end of the dictionary entry, the DPR will bring up an inflection table, even highlighting the matching case for you!
5 The Digital Pāḷi Dictionary
The DPD contains five different dictionaries and recognises a truly awesome 1.1 million unique inflected forms. It was the only dictionary to correctly recognise the Pāli word 'bhikkhunaṃ' and identify the declension as Dative. The DPD will also attempt to split compounds - though the DPR can be better at this. I think the DPD is the Pali dictionary that we have all being waiting for...
We'll next return to our look at Pali noun cases in more detail and noun attributes ...
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