Lesson 22: Using Past Participles

Like English, Sanskrit makes use of a past participle. The usual form of each is:

• Eng: (regular) root + ed — conquer “conquered,” dwell “dwelled”
• Skt: weak root + (इ)त — जि जित, “conquered,” वस् उषित, “dwelled”
• Skt: 10th cl. stem minus अय + इत — चोरय चोरित, “stolen”
  

(For more on formation, see 22 Formation.) English uses past participles especially in passive (patient-agreeing) and perfect (completed action) constructions. Thus, in English:

• passive: Submit the requested forms. They are required.
• perfect: Having defeated my enemies, I have attained victory.
  

Without going further into the comparison, we can say that passive-ness and perfect-ness are also important elements of the Sanskrit past participle. But to know whether a past participle is passive or active in Sanskrit, you need to know its verb type. And to know whether it refers to perfect (completed) action or not, you need to know the syntactic role it plays in its clause.

Voice depends on Verb Type

In general, the past participles of transitive verbs will be passive and those of intransitive verbs will be active. But the past participles of a few other transitive roots are also active: namely, verbs of motion, and a couple of intransitives made transitive by a prefix. Also, as Deshpande notes, simply adding the suffix -वत् to any past participle will make it active. Which gives us the following breakdown:

Root	Suffix	Voice	Examples
trans.	-(इ)त	pass.	खादित (having been) “eaten” or (were) “eaten”
intr.		act.	मुदित (having) “rejoiced” or (Rāma) “rejoiced”
v.o.m.			गत (having) “gone” or (Rāma) “went”
conv.			अधिष्ठित (having) “occupied” or (Rāma) “occupied”
Base
pp.	-वत्	act.	खादितवत् (having) “eaten” or (Rāma) “ate,” etc.

As verbal adjectives, past participles agree with the noun they qualify in gender, number and case. And unlike present participles, past participles can be used as sentence predicates. Hence, Deshpande’s example:

• रामेण फलानि खादितानि । “The fruit were eaten by Rāma.”
  

where the participle is passive since it is in the n.pl.nom. in order to agree with its patient, फलानि. And it is the predicate of the sentence as it stands, effectively, for an imperfect verb (अखाद्यन्त). On the other hand, we have active past participles built from intransitives and verbs of motion:

• रामो वने उषितः । “Rāma dwelled in the forest.”
  
• रामो ग्रामं गतः । “Rāma went to the village.”
  

where the participles are active in agreeing their verbs’ agent (m.s.nom. to agree with Rāma, the one doing the dwelling and going actions). Conventionally, a few intransitives that have been made transitive by an upasarga are also used actively, e.g.:

• रामो वनम् अधिष्ठितः । “Rāma dwelled in the forest.”
  

where the past participle (from अधि+स्था) agrees with its agent, though it is transitive thanks to its prefix, अधि. (These verbs are few in number and you needn’t worry about them too much to begin with.)

Of course, with the exclusively active past participle (pp. + वत्), voice does not depend on verb type. Regardless of root type or the voice of the pp. it is added to, the -वत् suffix creates an active past participle:

• रामो वनं गतवान् । “Rāma went to the forest.” (act. → act.)
  
• रामः फलानि खादितवान् । “Rāma ate the fruit.” (pass. → act.)
  

For rules of formation and declension, see 20 Formation.

Perfect, if not Sole Predicate

In the Sanskrit examples above, past participles are used as the sole predicate in each sentence. In such cases, the participle just stands for a simple past tense (“Rāma went. The fruit were eaten by Rāma,” etc.) In most other cases, however, the participle expresses a perfect sense (for completed action). For example:

• non-predicate active: ग्रामं गतो रामस् तुष्येत् ।
  “Rāma, (who has) gone to the village, should be pleased.”
  
• non-predicate passive: रामेण क्षालितानि फलानि लक्ष्मणेन अखाद्यन्त ।
  “The fruit (that had been) washed by Rāma was eaten by Lakṣmaṇa.”
  
• predicate active: रामो गतो भविष्यति ।
  “Rāma will be/have gone.”
• predicate passive: रामेण फलं खादितं भविष्यति ।
  “The fruit will be (will have been) eaten by Rāma.”

Which means that past participles, when not in the predicate, often function like gerunds (although they are adjectives and agree in gender case and number with their noun), as in the first examples above. Past participles from intransitive roots may not follow this rule of thumb, often being used as simple adjectives instead. For example, 

• कुपितो देव एवम् अवदत् । “The angry god spoke as follows.”

Here, कुपित needn’t specify a perfect sense (“having become angry”) instead of a simple adjectival one (“angry”). This is especially true of intransitive verbs indicating a state of mind or being.

Finally, as we saw in Lesson 16, both 1) intransitive verbs and 2) transitive verbs used intransitively, can be used impersonally (भावे प्रयोग). The same applies to past participles. They may be used impersonally—only as the sole predicate, where they have a simple past sense—in the neuter singular. Hence,

• रामेण वने उषितम् । “Dwelling in the forest was done by Rāma.”
• रामेण गतम् । “Going was done by Rāma.”

Voice	Not Sole Predicate = Perfect	As Sole Predicate = Imperfect
active	“having done (z),” x...	y “did”
	गतः (रामः)... “having gone,” (Rāma)...	(रामः) गतः (Rāma) “went”
passive	x “having been done,”...	y “was done”
	दृष्टः (ग्रामः)... “having been seen,” (the village)...	(ग्रामः) दृष्टः (the village) “was seen”
bhāve		“(verb action) was done”
		पतितम् “falling was done”