འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ ‘brel sgra

Alternative names: n/a

English names: connective particle

Pronunciation

In Ütsang dialect:

འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ ‘brel sgra: dreldra

Overview

The འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra> is a dependent particle with five different forms:

• གི་ gi
• ཀྱི་ kyi
• འི་ ‘i
• ཡི་ yi
• གྱི་ gyi

Meaning

The term འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra> means “connective particle” (or literally “connective sound”). These particles are called “connective particles” because they are used to connect concepts together. Specifically, they are used to connect a head word to a descriptive phrase in a way similar to the English words “of” or “which”. These particles are used for:

• In traditional grammar:
  • 6th case: འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra>
    • e.g. རི་བོང་གི་སུག་ལག་ <ri bong gi sug lag> “the rabbit‘s legs”
    • e.g. བོད་ཀྱི་ས་བཀྲ་ <bod kyi sa bkra> “Map of Tibet”
• In linguistics:
  • One nominal use:
    • the genitive case
  • One verbal use:
    • a disjunctive (“but”)

Note that the sixth case is also called the འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra>. Thus, the word འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra> can be used to refer either to these five particles, or to the sixth case. The context clarifies which meaning is intended.

Joining

The འབྲེལ་སྒྲ་ <‘brel sgra> particles are joined as follows:

After this letter:	Use this particle:	Examples and notes:
ག་ g ང་ ng	གི་ gi	བདག་གི་ bdag gi གང་གི་ gang gi
ད་ d བ་ b ས་ s	ཀྱི་ kyi	ཁྱོད་ཀྱི་ khyod kyi རྒྱབ་ཀྱི་ rgyab kyi གཡས་ཀྱི་ g.yas kyi
འ་ ‘ or syllables without a suffix letter	འི་ ‘i	After འ་ it replaces the འ་: མདའ་ mda’ > མདའི་ mda’i After syllables without a suffix letter it is added within the same syllable: དེ་ de > དེའི་ de’i
འ་ ‘ or syllables without a suffix letter	ཡི་ yi	After འ་: མདའ་ཡི་ mda’ yi After syllables without a suffix letter: དེ་ཡི་ de yi
ན་ n མ་ m ར་ r ལ་ l	གྱི་ gyi	མདུན་གྱི་ mdun gyi ལམ་གྱི་ lam gyi གསེར་གྱི་ gser gyi དངུལ་གྱི་ dngul gyi