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Unit: 1, Lesson: 4

Sandhi rules and using case suffixes (

When adding case suffixes to nouns, certain nouns undergo sound change.
The Sandhi Rules describe which nouns undergo which changes.
Sandhi Rules: Insertion of

and

When a word that ends in a vowel and a suffix that begins in a vowel are
added together, a glide - either
or
- is inserted in between. Selection
of either
or
is determined based upon whether the final vowel is one
of the 'front' vowels , , , or or one of the 'back' vowels , , ,
, or respectively. Front vowels take the glide
and back vowels
take the glide .

Front Vowels Back Vowels

Glide

Glide

and

and

and

and

and

Examples:
/ ending words

Younger
brother

Interrogative
suffix

Is it the
younger brother?

fly

Accusative/object
marker

Fly - object

NB: No literary Tamil word ends either in or

ending words

Table

interrogative suffix

(is this) a
table?

Store

From Ablative suffix

the store.

Y.
Sister

Because/By

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From

Because
of/by Y.Sister
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/ ending words

Street
Cow

Mosquito
Flower

Is this
street?

Interrogative suffix

To - Dative suffix

Mosquito

also.

Also

to the cow

In/at - Locative
suffix

In the flower.

Only those words with the syllable structure CVCV (consonant-vowelconsonant-vowel) as in

(street), (cow), (mosquito) take the
glide
as above. Most of the other words ending in like (that),

(song) etc., drop the final , when a vowel initial suffix is added as
shown below. However, this restriction does not apply to words ending in
, which always take the glide .
ending words other than CVCV structure

This

Interrogative suffix Is this?

Song Object suffix

Song - object

/ ending words

Interrogative
suffix

Tokyo

Is this
Tokyo?

/ ending words

Mother

With - Sociative
Suffix

Father

mother

Conjunctive Suffix

With

Father also.

Consonant Ending Words

Words with the syllable structure CVC, nouns ending in ,
and
, and
first and second person 'oblique' (possessive) forms (such as , and
) undergo a number of different changes when a case suffix is added.
Case suffixes in Tamil are listed as below.

Case Suffixes (

Tamil case suffixes are attached to the ends of nouns to express

grammatical relations (e.g., subject, direct object, etc.) as well as
meanings typically expressed in English through pre-positions (e.g., 'in', 'to',
'for', 'from', etc.).

Grammatical
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Written

Spoken

function

Note: - is
optional with
inanimate direct
objects but
obligatory for
Object/accusative
animate direct
(acc) suffix
objects of
transitive verbs
(e.g.,
'Look at
him').

Instrumental
(instr) suffix

By, because of

Dative (dat)
suffix

To

or

Possessive (poss)
of, 's
suffix

Locative suffix

In, at

Ablative suffix

From

Human locative
suffix

With, on

Human ablative
suffix

From

/
/

Sociative suffix

(Along) with

English gloss

Note that words that already have a locative meaning--e.g.,

(there), (here), (on top of)--when taking the ablative do not
require the locative case suffix. Hence,
(not

),
, etc.
Neither the interrogative suffix nor the conjunctive suffix nor the
emphative suffix follows sandhi rules as noted above when added with
words ending either in ,
or
or any of the pronoun.
Minimal words. Ex.

etc.

Any consonant ending noun with a syllable structure CVC where the vowel is
short is added with any suffix (both case suffix and others like interrogative
suffix, conjunctive suffix etc.), the final consonant is doubled.

Stone

Eye

Object suffix

Stone - Object

Interrogative
suffix

Eye - question

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Tooth

Leg

Object marker

Leg - Object (no

doubling)

Milk

Conjunctive
suffix

Dative

NB: The final

of
these words are long.

For the tooth

and

Milk also

do not double because the vowels in

ending words

When a case suffix is added with a noun that ends in , the final
is
deleted and an increment
is added. This rule applies only when the
suffix is a case suffix, but not for the other suffixes such as , , etc.

ending words

Tree

Object suffix

Tree - Object

Fruit

Tree

Interrogative
suffix

Is this a tree?

Emphative suffix

Sundaram indeed.

Conjunctive
suffix

Sundaram
Fruit

For/To
In

Sundaram

For

Sundaram

In the fruit

Fruit also

ending words

When a case suffix is added with a noun that ends either in

or
, the
final is deleted and the consonant ( or ) is doubled. However, the
suffixes such as conjunctive suffix , interrogative suffix and emphatic
suffix are added to these nouns without doubling the final consonant but
only the final is dropped.
/

ending words

House Object suffix

River

Forest Interrogative suffix Is this a forest?

River

Add
1)

For/To

House - Object.

Also

To the river.
River also.

and

2)
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3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
9)
10)
11)
12)
13)
14)
add and
1)
2)
3)
4)
5)
6)
7)
8)
9)
10)
11)
12)
13)
14)
South Asia Language Resource Center (SALRC)

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