käsklust

Käsklust is an Estonian grammar term referring to the imperative mood, the form a verb takes to express commands, requests, or direct instructions. The noun käsklus, from which käsklust is derived in its inflected form, denotes this mood in general. In usage, käsklust marks direct address: the speaker tells the listener to do something, as in orders or explicit instructions, or makes a polite request in certain contexts.

In Estonian, the imperative has distinct forms for direct address and varies with person, number, and formality. There are positive imperatives used to tell someone to perform an action, and negative imperatives that forbid an action. Negative imperatives are typically built with the particle ära plus the verb (for example, Ära mine). Polite or softened requests are often achieved with words like palun, either accompanying the imperative (Palun tee seda) or used in constructions that substitute a more courteous form for the direct command.

Käsklust as a grammatical category is primarily encountered in descriptive grammar, language teaching, and linguistic analysis. In everyday Estonian, speakers frequently use politeness strategies and alternative constructions rather than relying on a rigid imperative in all situations. The imperative mood also interacts with other verb forms in discourse, and its use can convey tone, urgency, or social relationship between speaker and listener.

Cross-linguistically, the imperative mood exists in many languages with similar functions but different formation rules and levels of formality. In Estonian, käsklust is one of several mood systems that structure how commands and requests are encoded in speech and writing.