Two grammars document different future formations

The Lodiana grammar’s sending paradigm prints an “Indefinite Future” with distinct masculine and feminine columns and singular and plural rows. Its masculine first-person form, shown below, is glossed as a future act of sending. Wilson’s Shahpur description instead presents a future built with an s element and personal endings. His table of doing distinguishes first, second and third persons and singular from plural; it does not reproduce the Lodiana gender columns. These are two documented formations with different structures. Finding one in a text is not evidence that the other table is mistaken or that every regional speaker must use both.[1][2]

A future label can accompany a possibility

The Lodiana “Future Present” of sending has both probability and future-action glosses. Its notes also allow a potential form to serve a future-indicative purpose. Wilson’s aorist is different from his s future: he describes suggestive, potential and conditional uses, although proverbs and poetry can give it a present meaning. In each book, mood and context affect how the construction is understood. A clause about what may happen, a conditional statement and a straightforward prediction should therefore be read through the complete example. Merely finding a future-related English heading cannot settle which meaning the author intended.[1][2]

Auxiliaries distinguish ongoing and completed actions

Wilson also forms compound tenses by combining present or past participles with the auxiliary meaning to become. His paired examples distinguish someone who will be doing work from someone who will have done it. In another example, the same future-looking auxiliary accompanies a present probability reading. The Lodiana paradigm likewise separates its future present from a future past, whose English gloss allows either a probable completed act or an act completed by a future time. These comparisons make the surrounding participle essential: an auxiliary does not carry the entire interpretation on its own. Keep the source, row and complete phrase beside any selected future form.[1][2]

Sources & notes

Source records include access dates and, where known, limits on what was examined. Checks used AI assistance; independent human or specialist review has not been completed.

  1. Lodiana American Presbyterian Mission Press; J. Newton attribution in the archive catalogue; Rev. J. Porter, press superintendent. A Grammar of the Panjabi Language; with Appendices ↗Historical descriptive and teaching grammar · Source date: 1851 · Locator: Printed pp.48–50,67–68 / PDF pp.61–63,80–81: Future Present, Future Past, Indefinite Future, and mood/tense notes §§90–95. Accessed 2026-11-02.The actual selected original text was read. The Future Past/Indefinite Future pages were visually checked, including the first-person Gurmukhi future. Probability and potential readings follow the printed glosses.Return to Script form 1 ↑Return to Two grammars document different future formations, paragraph 1 ↑Return to A future label can accompany a possibility, paragraph 1 ↑Return to Auxiliaries distinguish ongoing and completed actions, paragraph 1 ↑
  2. J. Wilson; acknowledged assistance of Munshi Mahbub Alam; Punjab Government Press. Grammar and Dictionary of Western Panjabi, as Spoken in the Shahpur District, with Proverbs, Sayings and Verses ↗Historical district grammar and dictionary · Source date: 1899 imprint; preface September 1898 · Locator: Printed pp.49–51,54 / PDF pp.67–69,72: aorist, s-future, and compound future/probability examples. Accessed 2026-11-02.The actual original passages were read and the future and compound-tense pages visually checked. The different forms are regionally scoped; no audio or current distribution survey was examined.Return to Two grammars document different future formations, paragraph 1 ↑Return to A future label can accompany a possibility, paragraph 1 ↑Return to Auxiliaries distinguish ongoing and completed actions, paragraph 1 ↑
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Record PH-LAN-0080 · English edition · human review not performed