Grammar of colloquial Tibetan - learning tibetan

CHAPTER VII. 69
in Tibetan hy him to me a heating is. So in the Passive Voice
/ am being beaten is expressed to me a beating is. The only
difference therefore between the Active and Passive is that
the Agent is omitted in the latter. Thus :—
Present C ( RS' P' ) ^^'^'^^^' '^^^ l^^^^", Iiho)dung~gi'dit,
I (you^ he) am being beaten.
Future C^'
( RS' P' ) ^^C^^'^C^' '^W^ O'-'hyo, kho) dung-yong.
I (you, he) shall be beaten.
Perfect REH^^'^'Z,' dung-song, or ^^C^^'Q.^^' dung-du, or
'^^C^^'^^^' dung sKa, Have (has) been beaten.
Future Passive Participle ^C^' dung-gyu, To be beaten. So
also ^U^'RcB^'^' y^ tshong-gyu, Turquoises to he sold or
turquoises for sale.
The Passive should, as far as possible, be avoided in trans-
lating, the corresponding Active tense being used instead.
8. Potential Verbs.—When can, could mean is able to,
translate by ^^'^' to be able, added to the root of the verb ;
e.g. YOU CAN {i.e. are able to) go to Darjeeling, R^'^' S'SI^''^'
^^'i^^'^n'-^S, I
khyo Dor-je-ling-la dro thup-Icyi-re. He can
DO THIS, P^'Qi^'3^'^^'[5''^S1 ^'^'^ ^^'^ ^^^ thup-kyi-re. It
will be seen from the above examples that the subject is put in
the agentive case, when the main v6rb is transitive and in
the nominative case, when the main verb is intransitive. A
similar rule applies to the permissive verbs and to the horta-
tive verbs dealt with in the two next paragraphs.