The Time-marker

The Time Marker marks time and occasions in relation to the verb or otherwise.

For example:

• “Thus did I hear at one time…” འདི་སྐད་བདག་གིས་ཐོས་པ་དུས་གཅིག་ན།
• “[I] studied when young.” ཚེ་སྟོད་དུ་སློབ་སྦྱོང་བྱས།

The Time Marker is always affixed to some term expressing a time, occasion or number. It is never affixed directly to verbs unless they are nominalised and, even then, there is an implicit time phrase involved.

For example:

• “We must get up when the sun rises.” ཉི་མ་ཤར་བ་ན་ཡར་ལང་དགོས།
• Is implicitly an abbreviation for: “We must get up at the time of the sun rise.” ཉི་མ་ཤར་བའི་ཚེ་ན་ཡར་ལང་དགོས།

If the nominalising particle is missing (e.g. ཉི་མ་ཤར་ན།), then it becomes a non-case usage of the ན་སྒྲ། that indicates the conditional, “If the sun rises…” (See section about non-case usages).

A different way to mark time in relation to a verb that does not utilise the Seventh Case is:

• “We must get up when the sun rises.” ཉི་མ་ཤར་དུས་ཡར་ལང་དགོས།

This has the same meaning as when using the Seventh Case because the Time Marker is marking the time of activity (བྱེད་དུས།) of the verb, e.g. འགྲོ་དུས། བསྡད་དུས། ཟ་དུས།

Up a level: The Seventh Case – Locative