SanskritOld friends in their first form
Learning Sanskrit vocabulary is unlike learning the vocabulary of a foreign language, because so much of it is already inside Hindi. Some words are used in Hindi exactly as they are in Sanskrit: these are called तत्सम (tatsama, "the same as that"), such as जल, सूर्य, पुस्तक, मित्र. Others changed their shape over the centuries as they passed through the spoken Prakrits: these are तद्भव (tadbhava, "born from that"), such as हाथ from हस्त, दूध from दुग्ध and आग from अग्नि.
The lists show both kinds side by side, the Sanskrit word and its Hindi meaning, so you can see the family likeness. Pairs of tatsama and tadbhava words are a regular question in school Hindi grammar.
The form given
Each noun is shown in the first case, singular: the form with its ending on, as it would stand as the doer of a sentence. So you will see सूर्यः, not the bare stem सूर्य that Hindi uses. The ending is a clue to the gender: -ः masculine, -आ, -ई feminine, -म् neuter. Knowing the gender tells you which table the word follows.
How to use the lists
- Read each word aloud, sounding the ending.
- Say its Hindi cousin and notice what changed.
- Put the word into one of the simple sentences: एषः सिंहः। ("This is a lion."), अहं फलं खादामि।
- Decline three words from each list through the first three cases.