A Textbook in Classical Tibetan is the first comprehensive course book in the Classical Tibetan language written in English. The textbook describes the grammar of pre-16th-century Classical Tibetan works for beginners and students of intermediate level. It is intended to cover the most essential topics that can be mastered within two semesters of an academic class. Classical Tibetan is a written Middle Tibetan language that has been in use in Tibet from the 9th century. Until the early 20th century it served all purposes, from administrative, to medical, to religious. Nowadays Classical Tibetan remains an important part of religious identity and services for communities also outside of cultural Tibet, foremost in India, Nepal, and Bhutan, but also elsewhere, most importantly in Europe, North America and Australia.
The main body of the textbook consists of an introduction to the Tibetan script, eighteen lessons, and a reading section. Each lesson elucidates several grammatical topics which are followed by an exercise and a word list. The chapter readings contain four supplementary readings. In addition to the main parts of the textbook, a brief introduction to Tibetic languages provides linguistic context for the language taught in the textbook, whereas the chapter Translations of Exercises and Readings contains translations and explanatory notes to the exercises provided at the end of each lesson, as well as to the readings.
A Textbook in Classical Tibetan is essential reading for both undergraduate and graduate students without any knowledge of Classical Tibetan, but also for those who would like to deepen their experience of the language by reading annotated excerpts from well-known pieces of Tibetan literature.
Acknowledgements
Introduction
Structure of the textbook
Language history
Tibetic languages and their genetic affiliation
Geographic distribution of Tibetic languages
Characterisation of Tibetic languages
Tibetic languages in diachrony
Written vs spoken Tibetic languages
Classical Tibetan
Tibetan script
History
The script
Syllable
Numbers
Punctuation marks
Word order in dictionaries
Tibetan transliteration of Indian scripts
Lesson 1
Word
Tibetan as an agglutinative language
Particles. An overview
Noun
Adjective
Demonstrative
Indefinite particle
Noun phrase
Grammatical case
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 2
Word order in a clause
Absolutive
Copula ཡིན་ and its negation མིན་
Number
Personal pronouns
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 3
Locative
Dative
Copula ཡོད་ and its negation མེད་
Genitive
Possessive pronouns
Final particle འོ་
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 4
Tibetan verbs. An overview
Intransitive verbs
Terminative case
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 5
Transitive verbs
Tibetan as an ergative language
Ergative
Comitative
Translation of clauses
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 6
Elative
Delative
Negation
Imperative
Prohibitive
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 7
Nominal particles
པ་ ~ བ་ particle
པ་ particle
པོ་ ~ བོ་ particle
པོ་ particle
མ་ particle
མོ་ particle
ཀ་ ~ ཁ་ ~ ག་ particle
ཀོ་ particle
General remarks
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 8
Converbs
Coordinative particle
Non-controllable transitive verbs
Speech register
Adverbs
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 9
Gerundial particle
Focus particle
Diminutive particle
Apposition
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 10
Concessive particle
Postpositions and postpositional phrases
Possessive particle ཅན་
Adjectives ལྡན་ and བཅས་
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 11
Questions
Nominalisation
Relative clauses
Exercise
Word list
Lesson 12
Case converbs
Verb + case particle
Verb + པ་/ བ་ + case particle
Reading
Lesson 13
Direct speech
Indirect speech
Interjections
Compounds
Modal verbs
Causative verb འཇུག་
Reading
Lesson 14
Passive
Possessive attributes
Complex attributes
Ellipsis
Omission of coreferential arguments
Impersonal clause
Other pronouns
Reading
Lesson 15
Morphology of transitive and intransitive verbs
Other converbial particles
Light verbs
Incorporation
Idioms
Measure words
Comparative and superlative
Double case particles
Ergative in quotations
Reading
Lesson 16
Auxiliary particle ཀྱིན་
Analytical verb constructions
Concessive auxiliary རུང་
Purposive particle རྒྱུ་
Reading
Lesson 17
Clause chaining
Determiners
Reduplication
Numerals
Reading
Lesson 18
Impact of Sanskrit on Classical Tibetan
Metrics
Reading
Readings
Reading I: Householder Dbyig-pa-čan
Reading II: The descent of Tibetan people from a monkey and a rock-ogress
Reading III: The death of Mi-la Ras-pa’s father
Reading IV: A Treasury of Aphoristic Jewels
Translations of exercises and readings
Exercises
Readings
Linguistic glossary
Appendices
Appendix A: Writing instructions
Appendix B: Transliteration systems. A comparative table
Appendix C: Combinations of sub-, pre-, and superscripts with base letters
Appendix D: Particles
Appendix E: Semantics of converbial particles
Appendix F: Analytical verb constructions
Appendix G: Syntactic structures
Glossary
Symbols and Abbreviations
Sigla
References
Subject index
Biography
Joanna Bialek is a research associate in the Department of Asian and African Studies, Humboldt-Universität Berlin, Germany.
