Reading a Sanskrit verse
You do not need to know Sanskrit to read a verse on Vedyatra. This guide walks through each part of a verse page, one step at a time.
The verse in Devanagari
At the top is the verse in Devanagari, the script most often used for Sanskrit today. It is written left to right, and the letters hang from a line along the top. A single bar (।) ends a half-verse; a double bar (॥) ends the verse, followed by its number.
Sanskrit has also been written in many other scripts over the centuries, such as Grantha, Śāradā, Bengali and Telugu. The sounds are the same; only the letters change.
Transliteration
Under the Devanagari is the same verse in Roman letters, using the International Alphabet of Sanskrit Transliteration (IAST). Marks above and below letters tell you how to pronounce them: ā, ī and ū are long vowels; ṛ is a vowel close to “ri”; ṭ and ḍ are said with the tongue curled back; ś and ṣ are two kinds of “sh”; ṃ nasalises the vowel before it; ḥ is a soft breath after a vowel.
So kṛṣṇa is said roughly “krish-na”, and karmaṇi “kar-ma-ni”. Turn transliteration on or off under “Display options”.
Why the words seem to run together
Sanskrit joins neighbouring sounds, a process called sandhi, so words often merge in writing. For example, yogasthaḥ kuru karmāṇi is three words, but in other verses two words may fuse into one long string. Compound words, such as aśru-pūrṇa-ākula-īkṣaṇam, “with eyes full of tears and troubled”, can join several words together.
Word by word
The word-by-word list splits the verse into its words and compounds and gives a short meaning for each. Read it alongside the transliteration to see which Sanskrit word carries which idea. The meanings are short on purpose; the translation below puts them together into a sentence.
Vedic accents
Verses from the Vedas carry pitch accents (svara), which guided how they were chanted. Vedyatra shows them as in printed editions: a line under a syllable (◌॒) marks the low pitch, anudātta, and a small stroke above (◌॑) marks the falling pitch, svarita. Unmarked syllables carry the raised pitch, udātta. Later texts such as the Gītā have no accent marks.
The translation and its source
The translation appears in the language you chose at the top of the page. Open “Source, licence and review” to see which edition the Sanskrit comes from, who translated it and whether a scholar or native speaker has reviewed it yet. If something looks wrong, “Suggest a correction” sends it to the reviewers.