Тамильская грамматика: основы и классификация именных частей речи.

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Much of Tamil grammar is extensively described in the oldest available grammar book for Tamil, the Tolkāppiyam (dated between 300 BCE and 300 CE). Modern Tamil writing is largely based on the 13th century grammar Naṉṉūl, which restated and clarified the rules of the Tolkāppiyam with some modifications.

The nouns stand for the names of objects both animate and inanimate, and abstract concepts. Nouns are the collections of names of animate/inanimate objects (பொருட்பெயர் ISO), places (இடப்பெயர் ISO), concepts of time (காலப்பெயர் ISO), names of limbs of animate/inanimate objects (சினைப்பெயர் ISO), qualitative nouns (பண்புப்பெயர் ISO) and verbal nouns (தொழிற்பெயர் ISO). Nouns of place stands for both conceptual names like town, village, heaven and real names like New York, Amsterdam. Nouns of time includes units of time, names of days of the week, names of months and seasons. Nouns of quality includes the nature and quality of the abstract and tangible objects. Example: names of tastes, shape, quantity, etc.

The nouns are divided into two main classes based on rationality: The "high class" (உயர்திணை ISO), and the "lower class" (அஃறிணை ISO). All the rational beings fall under the category of "high class". Examples could be Adult humans and deities. All the irrational beings and inanimate objects fall under the "lower class". Examples could be animals, birds, plants and things. Since children are considered to be irrational, the word "child" குழந்தை ISO is considered "lower class" or neuter.

The oblique stem of a noun is used before adding case suffixes, as a modifier in genitive function before a head noun, as the first element of a compound, and before postpositions. + Oblique Stem Formation Rule Tamil English Notes Nominative Oblique 0 peyar peyar name No change. The nominative is identical to the oblique stem. Most Tamil words belong to this group. 1 maram maratt(u) tree Final am is replaced with att(u). 2 pala palavaṟṟ(u) many Consists of only five words. The suffix aṟṟ(u) is added to the end of the word. 3 vīṭu vīṭṭ(u) house The consonant in the last syllable ṭu or ṟu is doubled, yielding ṭṭ(u) or ṟṟ(u). This applies to all words that end in ṭu or ṟu, except those consisting of two short syllables.

Tamil has no articles. Definiteness and indefiniteness are indicated either by context or by special grammatical devices, such as using the number "one" as an indefinite article. In the first person plural, Tamil makes a distinction between inclusive pronouns that include the listener and exclusive pronouns that do not. Tamil does not distinguish between adjectives and adverbs – both fall under the category uriccol. Conjunctions are called iṭaiccol. Verb auxiliaries are used to indicate attitude, a grammatical category which shows the state of mind of the speaker, and his attitude about the event spoken of in the verb. Common attitudes include pejorative opinion, antipathy, relief felt at the conclusion of an unpleasant event or period, and unhappiness at or apprehension about the eventual result of a past or continuing event.

Except in poetry, the subject precedes the object, and the verb concludes the sentence. In a standard sentence, therefore, the order is usually subject–object–verb (SOV), but object–subject–verb is also common. Tamil is a null subject language. Not all Tamil sentences have subjects, verbs and objects. It is possible to construct valid sentences that have only a verb, such as muṭintuviṭṭatu (முடிந்துவிட்டது, "It is completed"), or only a subject and object, such as atu eṉ vīṭu (அது என் வீடு, "That is my house"). The elements that are present, however, must follow the SOV order. Tamil does not have an equivalent for the existential verb to be; it is included in the translations only to convey the meaning. The negative existential verb, to be not, however, does exist in the form of illai (இல்லை) and goes at the end of the sentence (and does not change with number, gender, or tense). The verb to have in the meaning "to possess" is not translated directly, either. To say "I have a horse" in Tamil, a construction equivalent to "There is a horse to me" or "There exists a horse to me", is used. Tamil lacks relative pronouns, but their meaning is conveyed by relative participle constructions, built using agglutination. For example, the English sentence "Call the boy who learned the lesson" is said in Tamil like "That lesson learned boy call".

A sample passage in Tamil script with transliteration. Word (romanised) Translation Morphemes Part of speech Person, Gender, Tense Case Number Remarks āciriyar teacher āciriyar noun n/a, gender neutral, n/a nominative honorific plural indicated by suffix ar The feminine gender āciriyai can be used here too; the masculine gender āciriyaṉ is rarely used, considering the honored position of the teacher vakuppukkuḷ inside the class room vakuppu+aRai+uL adverb n/a locative n/a Sandhi (called puṇarci in Tamil) rules in Tamil require euphonic changes during agglutination (such as the introduction of y in this case) nuḻaintār entered nuḻaintār verb third, gender neutral, past honorific plural In an honorific context, the masculine and feminine equivalents nuḻaintāṉ and nuḻaintāḷ are replaced by the collective nuḻaintār avar He avar pronoun third, gender neutral, n/a nominative honorific plural indicated by suffix ar In honorific contexts, the masculine and feminine forms avaṉ and avaḷ are not used uḷḷē inside uḷḷē adverb n/a n/a nuḻaintavuṭaṉ upon entering nuḻainta + uṭaṉ adverb n/a n/a Sandhi rules require a v to be inserted between an end vowel and a beginning u during agglutination. māṇavarkaḷ students māṇavarkaḷ collective noun n/a, masculine, often used with gender neutral connotation, n/a nominative plural indicated by suffix kaḷ eḻunkaṉar got up eḻunkaṉar verb third, gender neutral, past plural Vaḷavaṉ VaLavan (name) Vaḷavaṉ proper noun n/a, masculine, usually indicated by suffix aṉ, n/a nominative singular maṭṭum only maṭṭum adjective n/a n/a taṉ his (self) own taṉ pronoun n/a, gender neutral, n/a singular arukil near (lit. "in nearness") aruku + il adverb n/a locative n/aThe postposition il indicates the locative case niṉṟu koṇṭirunta standing niṉṟu + koṇṭu + irunta adverb n/a n/a The verb has been morphed into an adverb by the incompleteness due to the terminal a māṇavi student māṇavi pronoun n/a, feminine, n/a singular Kaṉimoḻiyuṭaṉ with Kaṉimoḻi (name of a person) Kaṉimoḻi + uṭaṉ Proper noun n/a comitative n/a The name Kaṉimoḻi literally means sweet language pēcik koṇṭiruntāṉ was talking pēci + koṇṭu +iruntāṉ verb third, masculine, past continuous singular Continuousness indicated by the incompleteness brought by koṇṭu nāṉ I nāṉ pronoun first person, gender neutral, n/a nominative singular avaṉai him avanai pronoun third, masculine, n/a accusative singular The postposition ai indicates accusative case eccarittēṉ cautioned eccarittēṉ verb first, indicated by suffix ēn, gender neutral, past singular, plural would be indicated by substituting ēn with ōm