Grammatical case

Case is a special grammatical category of

a noun, pronoun, adjective, participle or
numeral whose value reflects the
grammatical function performed by that
word in a phrase, clause or sentence. In
some languages, nouns, pronouns,
adjectives, determiners, participles,
prepositions, numerals, articles and their
modifiers take different inflected forms,
depending on their case. As a language
evolves, cases can merge (for instance, in
Ancient Greek, the locative case merged
with the dative case), a phenomenon
formally called syncretism.[1]

English has largely lost its inflected case

system although personal pronouns still
have three cases, which are simplified
forms of the nominative, accusative and
genitive cases. They are used with
personal pronouns: subjective case (I, you,
he, she, it, we, they, who, whoever),
objective case (me, you, him, her, it, us,
them, whom, whomever) and possessive
case (my, mine; your, yours; his; her, hers;
its; our, ours; their, theirs; whose;
whosever[2]). Forms such as I, he and we
are used for the subject ("I kicked the
ball"), and forms such as me, him and us
are used for the object ("John kicked me").

Languages such as Ancient Greek,

Armenian, Assamese, most Balto-Slavic
languages, Basque, most Caucasian
languages, German, Icelandic, Japanese,
Korean, Latin, Sanskrit, Tamil, Tibetan (one
of a few tonal languages), the Turkic
languages and the Uralic languages have
extensive case systems, with nouns,
pronouns, adjectives, and determiners all
inflecting (usually by means of different
suffixes) to indicate their case. The
number of cases differs between
languages: Esperanto has two; modern
English has three but for pronouns only;
German and Icelandic have four;
Romanian has five; Latin, Russian and
Turkish each have at least six; Armenian,
Czech, Latvian, Lithuanian, Polish, Serbo-
Croatian and Ukrainian have seven;
Sanskrit and Tamil have eight; Estonian
has 14; Finnish has 15; Hungarian has 18
and Tsez has 64 cases.

Commonly encountered cases include

nominative, accusative, dative and
genitive. A role that one of those
languages marks by case is often marked
in English with a preposition. For example,
the English prepositional phrase with (his)
foot (as in "John kicked the ball with his
foot") might be rendered in Russian using
a single noun in the instrumental case or
in Ancient Greek as τῷ ποδί (tôi podí,
meaning "the foot") with both words (the
definite article, and the noun πούς (poús)
"foot") changing to dative form.

More formally, case has been defined as "a

system of marking dependent nouns for
the type of relationship they bear to their
heads".[3]:p.1 Cases should be
distinguished from thematic roles such as
agent and patient. They are often closely
related, and in languages such as Latin,
several thematic roles have an associated
case, but cases are a morphological
notion, and thematic roles a semantic one.
Languages having cases often exhibit free
word order, as thematic roles are not
required to be marked by position in the
sentence.

History
It is widely accepted that the Ancient
Greeks had a certain idea of the forms of a
name in their own language. A fragment of
Anacreon seems to prove this.
Nevertheless, it cannot be inferred that the
Ancient Greeks really knew what
grammatical cases were. Grammatical
cases were first recognized by the Stoics
and from some philosophers of the
Peripatetic school.[4][5] The advancements
of those philosophers were later employed
by the philologists of the Alexandrian
school.[6][4]

Etymology
The English word case used in this sense
comes from the Latin casus, which is
derived from the verb cadere, "to fall", from
the Proto-Indo-European root *ḱad-.[7] The
Latin word is a calque of the Greek
πτῶσις, ptôsis, lit. "falling, fall".[8] The
sense is that all other cases are
considered to have "fallen" away from the
nominative. This picture is also reflected in
the word declension, from Latin declinere,
"to lean", from the PIE root *ḱley-.

The equivalent to "case" in several other

European languages also derives from
casus, including cas in French, caso in
Spanish and Kasus in German. The
Russian word паде́ж (padyézh) is a calque
from Greek and similarly contains a root
meaning "fall", and the German Fall and
Czech pád simply mean "fall", and are used
for both the concept of grammatical case
and to refer to physical falls. The Finnish
equivalent is sija, whose main meaning is
"position" or "place".

Indo-European languages

On this sign in Russian memorializing an anniversary

of the city of Balakhna, the word Balakhna (Russian:
Балахна) on the right is in the nominative case,
whereas the word Balakhne (Russian: Балахне) is in
the dative case in Balakhne 500 Let ('Balakhna is 500
years old', or more literally 'To Balakhna 500 (of) years')
f f
on the front of the sign. Furthermore, let is in the
genitive (plural) case.

Although not very prominent in modern

English, cases featured much more
saliently in Old English and other ancient
Indo-European languages, such as Latin,
Old Persian, Ancient Greek, and Sanskrit.
Historically, the Indo-European languages
had eight morphological cases, though
modern languages typically have fewer,
using prepositions and word order to
convey information that had previously
been conveyed using distinct noun forms.
Among modern languages, cases still
feature prominently in most of the Balto-
Slavic languages (except Macedonian and
Bulgarian[9]), with most having six to eight
cases, as well as Icelandic, German and
Modern Greek, which have four. In German,
cases are mostly marked on articles and
adjectives, and less so on nouns. In
Icelandic, articles, adjectives, personal
names and nouns are all marked for case,
making it, among other things, the living
Germanic language that could be said to
most closely resemble Proto-Germanic.

The eight historical Indo-European cases

are as follows, with examples either of the
English case or of the English syntactic
alternative to case:
 Sample
Sample
Case Indicates case Interrogative Notes
sentence
words

Subject of a We went to Corresponds to English's

Nominative we Who or what?
finite verb the store. subject pronouns.

Corresponds to English's
The clerk
object pronouns and
remembered
preposition for
us, us.
Direct object construction before the
for us, John waited Whom or
Accusative of a transitive object, often marked by a
the for us at the what?
verb definite article the.
(object) bus stop.
Together with dative, it
Obey the
forms modern English's
law.
oblique case.

The clerk Corresponds to English's

gave us a object pronouns and
discount. preposition to construction
us,
The clerk before the object, often
Indirect object to us, Whom or to
Dative gave a marked by a definite article
of a verb to the what?
discount to the. Together with
(object)
us. accusative, it forms
According to modern English's oblique
the law... case.

The victim
Whence?
Movement went from
Ablative from us From
away from us to see the
where/whom?
doctor.

Genitive Possessor of 's, John's book Whose? From Roughly corresponds to

another noun of (the), was on the what or what English's possessive
his table. of? (possessive determiners
The pages and pronouns) and
of the book preposition of
turned construction.
yellow.
Table made
 out of wood.
To each his
own.

John, are
Vocative Addressee John you all right?
Hello, John!

We live in
China.
in
John is
China,
waiting for Roughly corresponds to
Location, at the Where or
us at the English prepositions in, on,
Locative either physical bus wherein?
bus stop. at, and by and other less
or temporal stop, When?
We will see common prepositions.
in the
what will
future
happen in
the future.

A means or
We wiped Corresponds to English
tool used or How? With
with a the floor prepositions by, with and
companion what or using
mop, with a mop. via as well as synonymous
Instrumental present what? By
by This letter constructions such as
in/while what means?
hand was written using, by use of and
performing an With whom?
by hand. through.
action

All of the above are just rough

descriptions; the precise distinctions vary
significantly from language to language,
and as such they are often more complex.
Case is based fundamentally on changes
to the noun to indicate the noun's role in
the sentence – one of the defining
features of so-called fusional languages.
Old English was a fusional language, but
Modern English does not work this way.

Modern English

Modern English has largely abandoned the

inflectional case system of Proto-Indo-
European in favor of analytic
constructions. The personal pronouns of
Modern English retain morphological case
more strongly than any other word class (a
remnant of the more extensive case
system of Old English). For other
pronouns, and all nouns, adjectives, and
articles, grammatical function is indicated
only by word order, by prepositions, and by
the "Saxon genitive" (-'s).[a]

Taken as a whole, English personal

pronouns are typically said to have three
morphological cases:

The nominative case (subjective

pronouns such as I, he, she, we), used for
the subject of a finite verb and
sometimes for the complement of a
copula.
The oblique case (object pronouns such
as me, him, her, us), used for the direct
 or indirect object of a verb, for the object
of a preposition, for an absolute
disjunct, and sometimes for the
complement of a copula.
The genitive case (possessive pronouns
such as my/mine, his, her/hers,
our/ours), used for a grammatical
possessor. This is not always
considered to be a case; see English
possessive § Status of the possessive
as a grammatical case.

Most English personal pronouns have five

forms: the nominative and oblique case
forms, the possessive case, which has
both a determiner form (such as my, our)
and a distinct independent form (such as
mine, ours) (with two exceptions: the third
person singular masculine and the third
person singular neuter it, which use the
same form for both determiner and
independent [his car, it is his]), and a
distinct reflexive or intensive form (such as
myself, ourselves). The interrogative
personal pronoun who exhibits the
greatest diversity of forms within the
modern English pronoun system, having
definite nominative, oblique, and genitive
forms (who, whom, whose) and
equivalently coordinating indefinite forms
(whoever, whomever, and whosever).
Though English pronouns can have subject
and object forms (he/him, she/her), nouns
show only a singular/plural and a
possessive/non-possessive distinction
(e.g. chair, chairs, chair's, chairs'). Note that
chair does not change form between "the
chair is here" (subject) and "I saw the
chair" (direct object), a distinction made by
word order and context.

Hierarchy of cases
Cases can be ranked in the following
hierarchy, where a language that does not
have a given case will tend not to have any
cases to the right of the missing
case:[3]:p.89

nominative → accusative or ergative →

genitive → dative → locative or
prepositional → ablative and/or
instrumental → others.

This is, however, only a general tendency.

Many forms of Central German, such as
Colognian and Luxembourgish, have a
dative case but lack a genitive. In Irish
nouns, the nominative and accusative
have fallen together, whereas the dative–
locative has remained separate in some
paradigms; Irish also has genitive and
vocative cases. In Punjabi, the accusative,
genitive, and dative have merged to an
oblique case, but the language still retains
vocative, locative, and ablative cases. Old
English had an instrumental case, but not
a locative or prepositional.

Case order
The traditional case order (nom-gen-dat-
acc) was expressed for the first time in
The Art of Grammar in the 2nd century BC:
Πτώσεις There are five Cases,
ὀνομάτων εἰσὶ the right [nominative],
πέντε· ὀρθή, the generic [genitive],
γενική, δοτική, the dative, the
αἰτιατική, accusative, and the
κλητική. vocative.[16]

The Russian language uses a similar case

order.[1]

Latin grammars, such as Ars grammatica,

followed the Greek tradition, but added the
ablative case of Latin. Later other
European languages also followed that
Graeco-Roman tradition.
However, for some languages, such as
Latin, due to case syncretism the order
may be changed for convenience, where
the accusative or the vocative cases are
placed after the nominative and before the
genitive. For example:

Latin
aqua, aquae bellum, bellī
water f. war n.

Singular Plural Singular Plural

Nominative
aqua aquae
Vocative bellum bella

Accusative aquam aquās

Genitive aquārum bellī bellōrum

aquae
Dative
aquīs bellō bellīs
Ablative aquā

Case concord systems

In the most common[3] case concord
system, only the head-word (the noun) in a
phrase is marked for case. This system
appears in many Papuan languages as
well as in Turkic, Mongolian, Quechua,
Dravidian, Indo-Aryan, and other
languages. In Basque and various
Amazonian and Australian languages, only
the phrase-final word (not necessarily the
noun) is marked for case. In many Indo-
European, Finnic, and Semitic languages,
case is marked on the noun, the
determiner, and usually the adjective.
Other systems are less common. In some
languages, there is double-marking of a
word as both genitive (to indicate
semantic role) and another case such as
accusative (to establish concord with the
head noun).[17]

Declension paradigms
Declension is the process or result of
altering nouns to the correct grammatical
cases. Languages with rich nominal
inflection (use grammatical cases for
many purposes) typically have a number
of identifiable declension classes, or
groups of nouns with a similar pattern of
case inflection or declension. Sanskrit has
six declension classes, whereas Latin is
traditionally considered to have five, and
Ancient Greek three declension classes.[18]
For example, Slovak has fifteen noun
declension classes, five for each gender
(the number may vary depending on which
paradigms are counted or omitted, this
mainly concerns those that modify
declension of foreign words; refer to
article).

In Indo-European languages, declension

patterns may depend on a variety of
factors, such as gender, number,
phonological environment, and irregular
historical factors. Pronouns sometimes
have separate paradigms. In some
languages, particularly Slavic languages, a
case may contain different groups of
endings depending on whether the word is
a noun or an adjective. A single case may
contain many different endings, some of
which may even be derived from different
roots. For example, in Polish, the genitive
case has -a, -u, -ów, -i/-y, -e- for nouns, and -
ego, -ej, -ich/-ych for adjectives. To a lesser
extent, a noun's animacy or humanness
may add another layer of complexity. For
example, in Russian:

Kot (NOM, animate, zero ending) lóvit

myshéy. ((The) cat catches mice)
Stolb (NOM, inanimate, zero ending)
dérzhit krýshu. ((The) pillar holds a/the
 roof)

vs.

Pyotr gládit kotá (ACC, animate, -a

ending). (Peter strokes a/the cat)

and

Pyotr lomáyet stolb (ACC, inanimate,

zero ending). (Peter breaks a/the pillar)

Examples
The examples and perspective in this section may
not represent a worldwide view of the subject.
Learn more

Belarusian
An example of a Belarusian case inflection
is given below, using the singular forms of
the Belarusian term for "country," which
belongs to Belarusian's first declension
class.

краіна (nominative) "[the] country" [as a

subject] (e.g. Гэта краіна знаходзіцца ў
Еўропе – this country is located in
Europe)
краіны (genitive) "[the] country's / [of
the] country" (e.g. Урад Нідэрландаў
знаходзіцца ў Гаазе, але сталіца
краіны - Амстэрдам – the Dutch
government is situated in The Hague,
but the country's capital is Amsterdam)
краіне (dative) "[to/for the] country" [as
an indirect object] (e.g. Новай краіне не
засталося ніякіх прыродных рэсурсаў
– there were no natural resources left
for the new country)
краіну (accusative) "country" [as a
direct object] (e.g. Я часта наведваю
гэту краіну – I often visit this country)
краінай (instrumental) "[with the]
country/[by the] country/[be a] country"
(e.g. Сінгапур быў беднай краінай –
Singapore was a poor country)
у краіне (locative) "[in the] country" [as a
direct object] (e.g. У краіне не хапае
 ежы – There is not enough food in the
country)

German

In German, grammatical case is largely

preserved in the articles and adjectives,
but nouns have lost many of their original
endings. Below is an example of case
inflection in German using the masculine
definite article and one of the German
words for "sailor".

der Seemann (nominative) "the sailor"

[as a subject] (e.g. Der Seemann steht da
– the sailor is standing there)
 des Seemann(e)s (genitive) "the sailor's /
[of] the sailor" (e.g. Der Name des
Seemannes ist Otto – the name of the
sailor is Otto)
dem Seemann(e) (dative) "[to/for] the
sailor" [as an indirect object] (e.g. Ich
gab dem Seemann ein Geschenk – I gave
a present to the sailor)
den Seemann (accusative) "the sailor"
[as a direct object] (e.g. Ich sah den
Seemann – I saw the sailor)

Greek

Modern Greek has four cases: nominative,

genitive, accusative, and vocative. For
neuters and most groups of feminines and
plural masculines, the genitive case differs
from the other three. Below is an example
of the declension of ουρανός (sky), which
has a different form in the singular of all
four cases, together with the appropriate
article in both the singular and the plural:

Nominative – ο ουρανός / οι ουρανοί

Genitive – του ουρανού / των ουρανών
Accusative – τον ουρανό / τους
ουρανούς
Vocative – ουρανέ / ουρανοί

Ancient Greek had one additional case, the

dative. At some point, it was replaced with
the preposition εις, followed by the
accusative. This became necessary when
pronunciation simplified, merging the two
long vowels eta and omega to short. The
result was that dative did not sound much
different from the accusative in the
singular of the first two groups. However,
the dative case is still used in many
expressions.

With time, only the sigma of εις was left

and got attached to the article, except
when an article is not used and it becomes
σε instead. Note that this is not a different
case from the accusative.
Below is an example with the dative case
of the word πόλη (city):

Nominative – ἡ πόλις / αἱ πόλεις

Genitive – τῆς πόλεως / τῶν πόλεων
Dative – τῇ πόλει / ταῖς πόλεσι(ν)
Accusative – τὴν πόλιν / τὰς πόλεις
Vocative – (ὦ) πόλι / (ὦ) πόλεις

Japanese

Cases in Japanese are marked by

particles placed after the nouns.[19] A
distinctive feature of Japanese is the
presence of two cases, which are roughly
equivalent to the nominative case in other
languages: one representing the sentence
topic, the other representing the subject.
The most important case markers are the
following:

Nominative - が (ga) for subject, は (wa)

for the topic
Genitive -の (no)
Dative - に (ni)
Accusative - を (wo)
Lative - へ (e), used for destination
direction (like in "to some place")
Ablative - から (kara), used for source
direction (like in "from some place")
Instrumental - で (de)
Korean
Cases in Korean are marked by particles
placed after the nouns, similar to
Japanese. Like Japanese, the nominative
case has two distinctions, one
representing the topic of a sentence and
the other the subject. In informal speech,
이 가 께서, and 에서) and
nominative ( / ,
accusative (을/를) particles are often
omitted, while dative (에게) and ablative
(에서) are shortened to simply 에, if the
meaning of the sentence can easily be
inferred from context. Most common case
markers are the following:

Nominative - 이/가 (i/ga) for the subject,

께서 (kkeseo) for the subject with being
 respectful, 에서 (eseo) for the subject of
multitude or organism
Genitive - 의 (ui; although transliterated
as ui, nowadays it is pronounced the
same as 에)
Dative - 에게 (ege), 한테 (hante)
Accusative - 을/를 (eul/reul)
Lative - 에 (e), used for destination
direction (like in "to some place")
Ablative - 에서 (eseo), used for source
direction (like in "from some place")
Instrumental -로/으로 (ro/uro)
Vocative - 아/야 (a/ya)

Latin
An example of a Latin case inflection is
given below, using the singular forms of
the Latin term for "cook," which belongs to
Latin's second declension class.

coquus (nominative) "[the] cook" [as a

subject] (e.g. coquus ibī stat – the cook
is standing there)
coquī (genitive) "[the] cook's / [of the]
cook" (e.g. nōmen coquī Claudius est –
the cook's name is Claudius)
coquō (dative) "[to/for the] cook" [as an
indirect object] (e.g. coquō dōnum dedī
– I gave a present to the cook)
coquum (accusative) "[the] cook" [as a
direct object] (e.g. coquum vīdī – I saw
 the cook)
coquō (ablative) "[by/with/from/in the]
cook" [in various uses not covered by
the above] (e.g. sum altior coquō – I am
taller than the cook: ablative of
comparison)
coque (vocative) "[you] the cook"
[addressing the object] (e.g. grātiās tibi
agō, coque – I thank you, cook)

Latvian

Latvian nouns have seven grammatical

cases: nominative, genitive, dative,
accusative, instrumental, locative and
vocative. The instrumental case is always
identical to the accusative in the singular
and to the dative in the plural. It is used as
a free-standing case (without a
preposition) only in highly restricted
contexts in modern Latvian.

An example of a Latvian case inflection is

given below, using the singular forms of
the Latvian term for "man," which belongs
to the first declension class.

Nominative: vīrs
Genitive: vīra
Dative: vīram
Accusative: vīru
Instrumental: ar vīru
Locative: vīrā
 Vocative: vīr

Lithuanian

In Lithuanian, only the inflection usually

changes in the seven different
grammatical cases:

Nominative (vardininkas): šuo – Tai yra

šuo – "This is a dog."
Genitive (kilmininkas): šuns – Tomas
paėmė šuns kaulą – "Tom took the dog's
bone."
Dative (naudininkas): šuniui – Jis davė
kaulą kitam šuniui – "He gave the bone
to another dog."
 Accusative (galininkas): šunį – Jis
nuprausė šunį – "He washed the dog."
Instrumental (įnagininkas): šunimi – Jis
šunimi išgąsdino kates – He scared the
cats with (using) the dog.
Locative (vietininkas): šunyje –
Susitiksime „Baltame šunyje“ – "We'll
meet at the White Dog (Cafe)."
Vocative (šauksmininkas): šunie – Jis
sušuko: Ei, šunie! – "He shouted: Hey,
dog!"

Malayalam

Vocative forms are given in parentheses

after the nominative, as the only
pronominal vocatives that are used are the
third person ones, which only occur in
compounds[20].

Singular Plural

Third Third First First

First Second Second Th
Case person person person person
person person person Per
(masculine) (feminine) (exclusive) (inclusive)

Nominative ñāṉ nī, avaṉ (voc. avaḷ (voc. ñaṅgaḷ nām/ niṅṅaḷ avar
ningal avaṉē) avaḷē) nammaḷ (voc

avar

Accusative eṉṉe niṉṉe avaṉe avaḷe ñaṅgaḷe nammale niṅgaḷe avar

eṉṯe niṉṯe
avaṉṯe ñaṅgaḷuṭe
(also (also
Genitive (also avaḷuṭe (also nammuṭe niṅgaḷuṭe avar
eṉ, niṉ,
avaṉuṭe) ñaṅguṭe)
eṉṉuṭe) niṉṉuṭe)

Dative eṉikku niṉakku avaṉu avaḷkku ñammaḷkku namukku niṅgaḷkku avar

ñaṅgaḷāl niṅgaḷāl
Instrumental eṉṉāl niṉṉāl avaṉāl avaḷāl (also nammāl (also avar
ñaṅṅāl) niṅṅāl)

eṉṉil niṉṉil avaḷil avar

avaṉil (also
Locative (also (also (also ñaṅgaḷil nammil niṅgaḷil (als
avaṅkal)
eṅkal) niṅkal) avaḷkal) avaṟ

Sociative eṉṉōṭu niṉṉōṭu avaṉōṭu avaḷōṭu ñaṅgaḷōṭu nammōṭu niṅgaḷōṭu avar

Polish
An example of a Polish case inflection is
given below, using the singular forms of
the Polish terms for "human" (człowiek)
and "monkey" (małpa)

Nominative (mianownik): człowiek,

małpa
Genitive (dopełniacz): człowieka, małpy
Dative (celownik): człowiekowi, małpie
Accusative (biernik): człowieka, małpę
Instrumental (narzędnik): człowiekiem,
małpą
Locative (miejscownik): człowieku,
małpie
 Vocative (wołacz): człowieku (or
człowiecze), małpo

Hungarian

Hungarian declension is relatively simple

with regular suffixes attached to the vast
majority of nouns. The following table lists
a few of the many cases used in
Hungarian.
lakás – flat/apartment
Meaning of the
Suffix Meaning Example Case name
example

flat/apartment (as a
∅ subject 'lakás' Nominative case
subject)

-ot/(-at)/-et/- flat/apartment (as

direct object 'lakást' Accusative case
öt/-t an object)

-nak/-nek indirect object 'lakásnak' to the flat/apartment Dative case

-val/-vel with the Instrumental-

with 'lakással'
(Assim.) flat/apartment comitative case

for the
-ért for, for the purpose of 'lakásért' Causal-final case
flat/apartment

-vá/-vé into (used to show [turn] into a

'lakássá' Translative case
(Assim.) transformation) flat/apartment

as far as the
-ig as far as, up to 'lakásig' Terminative case
flat/apartment

into the a
-ba/-be into (location) 'lakásba' Illative case
flat/apartment

Romanian

Romanian is the only modern major

Romance language with a case system for
all nouns, whereas all other Romance
languages dropped the cases for nouns
replacing them by prepositions. An
example of Romanian case inflection is
given below, using the singular form of the
word "boy":

Băiatul (nominative) "[the] boy" [as a

subject] (e.g. Băiatul a stat acasă – the
boy stayed home)
Băiat (accusative) "boy" [as a direct
object] (e.g. L-am văzut aseară pe băiat –
I saw the boy last night)
Băiatului (genitive) "[the] boy's / [of the]
boy" (e.g. Bicicleta băiatului s-a stricat –
the boy's bike broke down)
Băiatului (dative) "[to the] boy" (e.g. I-am
dat un cadou băiatului – I gave the boy a
gift)
 Băiete! (vocative) "Boy!" (e.g. Stai acasă,
băiete! – stay at home boy!)

Russian

An example of a Russian case inflection is

given below (with explicit stress marks),
using the singular forms of the Russian
term for "sailor," which belongs to
Russian's first declension class.

моря́к (nominative) "[the] sailor" [as a

subject] (e.g. Там стоит моряк: The
sailor is standing there)
морякá (genitive) "[the] sailor's / [of the]
sailor" (e.g. Сын моряка — художник:
The sailor's son is an artist)
моряку́ (dative) "[to/for the] sailor" [as
an indirect object] (e.g. Моряку
подарили подарок: (They/Someone)
gave a present to the sailor)
морякá (accusative) "[the] sailor" [as a
direct object] (e.g. Вижу моряка: (I) see
the sailor)
моряко́м (instrumental) "[with/by the]
sailor" [as a direct object] (e.g. Дружу с
моряком: (I) have a friendship with the
sailor)
о/на/в моряке́ (prepositional) "
[about/on/in the] sailor" [as a direct
object] (e.g. Думаю о моряке: (I) think
about the sailor)
Up to ten additional cases are identified by
linguists, although today all of them are
either incomplete (do not apply to all
nouns or do not form full word paradigm
with all combinations of gender and
number) or degenerate (appear identical to
one of the main six cases). The most
recognized additional cases are locative (в
лесу́, на мосту́, в слеза́х), partitive (ча́ю,
са́хару, песку́), and two forms of vocative
— old (Го́споди, Бо́же, о́тче) and neo-
vocative (Маш, пап, ребя́т). Sometimes,
so called count-form (for some countable
nouns after numerals) is considered to be
a sub-case. See details.
Sanskrit

Grammatical case was analyzed

extensively in Sanskrit. The grammarian
Pāṇini identified six semantic roles or
kāraka,[21] which by default are related to
the following eight Sanskrit cases in
order:[22]
Sanskrit cases
Default thematic
Order English case Example with राम (singular, dual, plural)
role

Case 1 थमा Kartṛ Nominative रामः (rāmaḥ), रामौ (rāmau), रामाः (rāmāḥ)

Case 2
Karman Accusative रामम् (rāmam), रामौ (rāmau), रामान् (rāmān)
तीया

Case 3 रामेण (rāmeṇa), रामा याम् (rāmābhyām), रामैः

Karaṇa Instrumental
तृतीया (rāmaiḥ)

रामाय (rāmāya), रामा याम् (rāmābhyām), रामे यः

Case 4 चतुथ Sampradāna Dative
(rāmebhyaḥ)

Case 5 रामात् (rāmāt), रामा याम् (rāmābhyām), रामे यः

Apādāna Ablative
पञचमी (rāmebhyaḥ)

राम य (rāmasya), रामयोः (rāmayoḥ), रामाणाम्

Case 6 ष ी Sambandha Genitive
(rāmāṇām)

Case 7
Adhikaraṇa Locative रामे (rāme), रामयोः (rāmayoḥ), रामेषु (rāmeṣhu)
स तमी

Case 8 हे राम (he rāma), हे रामौ (he rāmau), हे रामाः (he

Sambodhana Vocative
स बोधन rāmāḥ)

For example, in the following sentence leaf

is the agent (kartā, nominative case), tree
is the source (apādāna, ablative case), and
ground is the locus (adhikaraṇa, locative
case). The declensions are reflected in the
morphemes -āt, -am, and -au respectively.
 vṛkṣ-āt parṇ-am bhūm-au patati
from the tree a leaf to the ground falls

However, the cases may be deployed for

other than the default thematic roles. A
notable example is the passive
construction. In the following sentence,
Devadatta is the kartā, but appears in the
instrumental case, and rice, the karman,
object, is in the nominative case (as
subject of the verb). The declensions are
reflected in the morphemes -ena and -am.

devadatt-ena odan-am pacyati

by Devadatta the rice is cooked

Assamese
Assamese has ten cases.

Example
Usual Transliteration with চিল
English Significance
Suffixes of Suffixes (suli,
“hair”)

(I) Absolutive Subject of sentence Ø Ø suli

(II) Ergative Agent এ ( য়, ৱ), ই e, i sulie

অক / ক
(III) Accusative Object of action (animate); Ø ok / k; Ø sulik; suli
(inanimate)

(IV) Genitive Possessive অৰ or / r sulir

Object to whom action is

(V) Dative performed, object for whom অক / ক ok / k sulik
action is performed

Object to whom action is

Dative of
(VI) performed, object for whom অৈল / ল oloi / loi suliloi
motion form
action is performed

(VII) Terminative অৈলেক / লেক oloike / loike suliloike

Instrumental
(VIII) of motion Means by which action is done এেৰ / ৰ ere / re sulire
from

Place in which, On the person of

(IX) Locative অত / ত ot / t sulit
(animate) in the presence of

o suli!,
(X) Vocative Addressing, calling অ, Ø, হ o, Ø, he suli!, he
suli!

Tamil
The Tamil case system is analyzed in
native and missionary grammars as
consisting of a finite number of
cases.[23][24] The usual treatment of Tamil
case (Arden 1942)[25] is one in which there
are seven cases: nominative (first case),
accusative (second case), instrumental
(third), dative (fourth), ablative (fifth),
genitive (sixth), and locative (seventh). In
traditional analyses, there is always a clear
distinction made between post-positional
morphemes and case endings. The
vocative is sometimes given a place in the
case system as an eighth case, but
vocative forms do not participate in usual
morphophonemic alternations and do not
govern the use of any postpositions.
Modern grammarians, however, argue that
this eight-case classification is coarse and
artificial[24] and that Tamil usage is best
understood if each suffix or combination
of suffixes is seen as marking a separate
case.[26]
 Usual Suffixes in
Tamil English Significance Example
suffixes Tamil

First case(எ வா Subject of

Nominative [Zero] mannan (ம ன
ேவ ைம) sentence

Second case
mannanai
(ெசய ப ெபா Accusative Object of action -ai ஐ
(ம ைன)
ேவ ைம)

Means by which
mannanaal,
action is done
mannanudan,
Third case (க வ/ (Instrumental), -al, - ஆ ,
Instrumental, mannanOdu,
ைண Association, or udan, - உட ,
Social (ம னனா ,
ேவ ைம) means by which kondu ெகா
ம ன ட ,
action is done
ம னேனா )
(Social)

mannanukku,
Object to whom mannanin porut
action is (u)kku. , mannanukkaaga
Fourth case Dative performed, Object poruttu, ெபா , (ம ன
for whom action is aaga ஆக ம னனி
performed ெபா ,
ம ன கா

mannanin, mann
Motion from an mannanilirundu
Ablative of -in, -il, - இ ,இ ,
Fifth case animate/inanimate (ம னனி ,
motion from ilrundu இ
object ம னனி ,
ம னனி

mannanadu,
athu, அ , mannanudaiya
Sixth case Genitive Possessive
udaiya உைடய (ம னன ,
ம ன ைடய

Seventh case Locative Place in which, On -il, - இ , vīṭṭil, mannanida

the person of idam; இட ; ( ,
(animate) in the kaṇ க (Old ம னனிட );
presence of Tamil) ரியா க =
 (Old கீேழாரிட ;
Tamil) ப ற றக
= ெச வமி ல
ந ைலய

mannanE, mann
Eighth case (வ ளி
Vocative Addressing, calling e, a ஏ, ஆ (ம னேன,
ேவ ைம)
ம னவா)

Telugu

Telugu has eight cases.

 Usual Transliteration
Telugu English Significance
Suffixes of Suffixes

Prathamā
డు, ము,
(I) Vibhakti (పథ Nominative Subject of sentence ḍu, mu, vu, lu
, లు
భ )

, ను ,
nin, nun, lan,
Dvitīyā Vibhakti ల ,
(II) Accusative Object of action kūrchi,
( భ ) కూ ,
gurinchi
గు ం

Means by which action is త ,

Trutīyā Vibhakti Instrumental, done (Instrumental); , chētan, chēn,
(III)
(తృ భ ) Social Association, or means by డ , tōḍan, tōn
which action is done (Social)

Object to whom action is

Chaturthi Vibhakti ఱకు ,
(IV) Dative performed, object for whom korakun, kai
(చతు భ )
action is performed

Panchamī వలన ,
Ablative of Motion from an valanan,
(V) Vibhakti (పంచ కం ,
motion from animate/inanimate object kaṃṭen, paṭṭi
భ ) ప

, కు ,
Shashthī Vibhakti క , kin, kun, yokka,
(VI) Genitive Possessive
(ష భ ) , lōn, lōpalan
పల

Place in which, On the person

Saptamī Vibhakti అందు ,
(VII) Locative of (animate) in the presence aṃdun, nan
(సప భ ) న
of

Sambodhanā
Prathamā
ఓ, ఓ ,
(VIII) Vibhakti Vocative Addressing, calling ō, ōī, ōrī, ōsī
ఓ ,ఓ
(సం ధ పథ
భ )
Evolution
As languages evolve, case systems
change. In early Ancient Greek, for
example, the genitive and ablative cases
became combined, giving five cases,
rather than the six retained in Latin. In
modern Hindi, the Sanskrit cases have
been reduced to three: a direct case (for
subjects and direct objects) and oblique
case, and a vocative case.[27][28] In English,
apart from the pronouns discussed above,
case has vanished altogether except for
the possessive/non-possessive dichotomy
in nouns.
The evolution of the treatment of case
relationships can be circular.[3]:pp.167–174
Adpositions can become unstressed and
sound like they are an unstressed syllable
of a neighboring word. A postposition can
thus merge into the stem of a head noun,
developing various forms depending on
the phonological shape of the stem.
Affixes can then be subject to various
phonological processes such as
assimilation, vowel centering to the schwa,
phoneme loss, and fusion, and these
processes can reduce or even eliminate
the distinctions between cases.
Languages can then compensate for the
resulting loss of function by creating
adpositions, thus coming full circle.

Recent experiments in agent-based

modeling have shown how case systems
can emerge and evolve in a population of
language users.[29] The experiments
demonstrate that language users may
introduce new case markers to reduce the
cognitive effort required for semantic
interpretation, hence facilitating
communication through language. Case
markers then become generalized through
analogical reasoning and reuse.

Linguistic typology
Morphosyntactic alignment

Languages are categorized into several

case systems, based on their
morphosyntactic alignment—how they
group verb agents and patients into cases:

Nominative–accusative (or simply

accusative): The argument (subject) of
an intransitive verb is in the same case
as the agent (subject) of a transitive
verb; this case is then called the
nominative case, with the patient (direct
object) of a transitive verb being in the
accusative case.
Ergative–absolutive (or simply ergative):
The argument (subject) of an
intransitive verb is in the same case as
the patient (direct object) of a transitive
verb; this case is then called the
absolutive case, with the agent (subject)
of a transitive verb being in the ergative
case.
Ergative–accusative (or tripartite): The
argument (subject) of an intransitive
verb is in its own case (the intransitive
case), separate from that of the agent
(subject) or patient (direct object) of a
transitive verb (which is in the ergative
case or accusative case, respectively).
Active–stative (or simply active): The
argument (subject) of an intransitive
verb can be in one of two cases; if the
argument is an agent, as in "He ate," then
it is in the same case as the agent
(subject) of a transitive verb (sometimes
called the agentive case), and if it is a
patient, as in "He tripped," then it is in the
same case as the patient (direct object)
of a transitive verb (sometimes called
the patientive case).
Trigger: One noun in a sentence is the
topic or focus. This noun is in the trigger
case, and information elsewhere in the
sentence (for example a verb affix in
Tagalog) specifies the role of the trigger.
 The trigger may be identified as the
agent, patient, etc. Other nouns may be
inflected for case, but the inflections are
overloaded; for example, in Tagalog, the
subject and object of a verb are both
expressed in the genitive case when
they are not in the trigger case.

The following are systems that some

languages use to mark case instead of, or
in addition to, declension:

Positional: Nouns are not inflected for

case; the position of a noun in the
sentence expresses its case.
Adpositional: Nouns are accompanied
by words that mark case.
Language families

With a few exceptions, most languages

in the Uralic family make extensive use
of cases. Finnish has 15 cases
according to the traditional description
(or up to 30 depending on the
interpretation).[30] However, only 12 are
commonly used in speech (see Finnish
noun cases and Finnish locative
system). Estonian has 14 (see Estonian
locative system) and Hungarian has 18,
both with additional archaic cases used
for some words.
Turkic, Mongolic, and Tungusic
languages also exhibit complex case
systems. Since the abovementioned
languages, along with Korean and
Japanese, shared certain similarities,
linguists proposed an Altaic family and
reconstructed its case system; although
the hypothesis had been largely
discredited.
The Tsez language, a Northeast
Caucasian language, has 64 cases.
The original version of John Quijada's
constructed language Ithkuil has 81
noun cases,[31] and its descendent
Ilaksh and Ithkuil after the 2011 revision
both have 96 noun cases.[32][33]
The lemma form of words, which is the
form chosen by convention as the
canonical form of a word, is usually the
most unmarked or basic case, which is
typically the nominative, trigger, or
absolutive case, whichever a language
may have.

See also
Agreement (linguistics)
Case hierarchy
Declension
Differential object marking
Inflection
List of grammatical cases
 Phi features
Thematic relation
Verbal case
Voice (grammar)

Notes
a. The status of the possessive as an
affix or a clitic is the subject of
debate.[10][11] It differs from the noun
inflection of languages such as
German, in that the genitive ending
may attach to the last word of the
phrase. To account for this, the
possessive can be analysed, for
instance as a clitic construction (an
 "enclitic postposition"[12]) or as an
inflection[13][14] of the last word of a
phrase ("edge inflection").[15]

References
1. Clackson 2007, p. 91.
2. The Chambers Dictionary, 11th edition
3. Blake, Barry J. Case. Cambridge
University Press: 2001.
4. "Linguaggio nell'Enciclopedia
Treccani" .
5. Michael, Ian (2010-06-10). English
Grammatical Categories: And the
Tradition to 1800 .
ISBN 9780521143264.
6. Frede, Michael (1994). "The Stoic
Notion of a Grammatical Case".
Bulletin of the Institute of Classical
Studies. 39: 13–24.
JSTOR 43646836 .
7. Harper, Douglas. "case" . Online
Etymology Dictionary.
8. "L. cāsus used to translate Gr. πτῶσις
lit. 'falling, fall'. By Aristotle πτῶσις
was applied to any derived, inflected,
or extended form of the simple ὄνομα
or ῥῆμα (i.e. the nominative of nouns,
the present indicative of verbs), such
as the oblique cases of nouns, the
variations of adjectives due to gender
 and comparison, also the derived
adverb (e.g. δικαίως was a πτῶσις of
δίκαιος), the other tenses and moods
of the verb, including its interrogative
form. The grammarians, following the
Stoics, restricted πτῶσις to nouns,
and included the nominative under the
designation". "case" . Oxford English
Dictionary (3rd ed.). Oxford University
Press. September 2005. (Subscription
or UK public library membership required.)

9. Slavic Languages on quickia.com

Archived 2009-11-21 at the Wayback
Machine
10. Hudson, Richard (2013). "A cognitive
analysis of John's hat". In Börjars,
Kersti; Denison, David; Scott, Alan
(eds.). Morphosyntactic Categories
and the Expression of Possession.
John Benjamins Publishing Company.
pp. 123–148. ISBN 9789027273000.
11. Börjars, Kersti; Denison, David;
Krajewski, Grzegorz; Scott, Alan
(2013). "Expression of Possession in
English". In Börjars, Kersti; Denison,
David; Scott, Alan (eds.).
Morphosyntactic Categories and the
Expression of Possession. John
Benjamins Publishing Company.
pp. 149–176. ISBN 9789027273000.
12. Quirk, Randolph; Greenbaum, Sidney;
Leech, Geoffrey; Svartvik, Jan (1985).
A Comprehensive Grammar of the
English Language. Harlow: Longman.
p. 328. ISBN 978-0-582-51734-9. "[the -
s ending is] more appropriately
described as an enclitic postposition'"
13. Greenbaum, Sidney (1996). The Oxford
English Grammar. Oxford University
Press. pp. 109–110. ISBN 978-0-19-
861250-6. "In speech the genitive is
signalled in singular nouns by an
inflection that has the same
pronunciation variants as for plural
nouns in the common case"
14. Quirk, Randolph; Greenbaum, Sidney;
Leech, Geoffrey; Svartik, Jan (1985). A
Comprehensive Grammar of the
English Language. Longman. p. 319.
"In writing, the inflection of regular
nouns is realized in the singular by
apostrophe + s (boy's), and in the
regular plural by the apostrophe
following the plural s (boys')"
15. Payne, John; Huddleston, Rodney
(2002). "Nouns and noun phrases". In
Huddleston, Rodney; Pullum, Geoffrey
(eds.). The Cambridge Grammar of the
English Language. Cambridge; New
York: Cambridge University Press.
pp. 479–481. ISBN 978-0-521-43146-
 0. "We conclude that both head and
phrasal genitives involve case
inflection. With head genitives it is
always a noun that inflects, while the
phrasal genitive can apply to words of
most classes."
16. The grammar of Dionysios Thrax .
Translated by Tomas Davidson. St.
Loius: Studley. 1874. p. 10.
17. Campbell, Lyle. "Glossary of historical
linguistics" .
18. Frank Beetham, Learning Greek with
Plato, Bristol Phoenix Press, 2007.
19. Takahashi, Tarou; et al. (2010). A
Japanese Grammar (in Japanese) (4
 ed.). Japan: Hitsuji Shobou. p. 27.
ISBN 978-4-89476-244-2.
20. Malayalam grammar#Personal
pronouns
21. Pieter Cornelis Verhagen, Handbook of
oriental studies: India. A history of
Sanskrit grammatical literature in
Tibet, Volume 2 , BRILL, 2001,
ISBN 90-04-11882-9, p. 281.
22. W.D. Whitney, Sanskrit Grammar
23. "The Tamil Case System" (PDF).
Ccat.sas.upenn.edu. Retrieved
20 November 2014.
24. K. V. Zvelebil (1972). "Dravidian Case-
Suffixes: Attempt at a Reconstruction".
 Journal of the American Oriental
Society. 92 (2): 272–276.
doi:10.2307/600654 . JSTOR 600654 .
25. Arden, A. H. 1942, repr. 1969. A
Progressive Grammar of the Tamil
Language. Madras: Christian Literature
Society.
26. Harold F. Schiffman (June 1998).
"Standardization or restandardization:
The case for "Standard" Spoken
Tamil". Language in Society. 27 (3):
359–385.
doi:10.1017/S0047404598003030 .
27. R. S. McGregor, Outline of Hindi
Grammar, Oxford University Press,
 1972.
28. Spencer, A. (2005). Case in Hindi. In
Proceedings of the LFG05 Conference.
Retrieved from
http://web.stanford.edu/group/cslipub
lications/cslipublications/LFG/10/lfg0
5.html
29. Remi van Trijp, "The Evolution of Case
Systems for Marking Event Structure
Archived 2013-06-18 at the Wayback
Machine". In: Steels, Luc (Ed.),
Experiments in Cultural Language
Evolution, Amsterdam: John
Benjamins, 2012, p. 169-205.
30. "Finnish Grammar – Adverbial cases" .
Users.jyu.fi. Retrieved 15 September
2014.
31. "A Philosophical Grammar of Ithkuil, a
Constructed Language – Chapter 4:
Case Morphology" . Ithkuil.net.
Archived from the original on June 8,
2009. Retrieved 15 September 2014.
32. "Chapter 4" . Archived from the
original on March 12, 2009. Retrieved
15 September 2014.
33. "A Grammar of the Ithkuil Language –
Chapter 4: Case Morphology" .
Ithkuil.net. Retrieved 15 September
2014.
General references

Clackson, James (2007). Indo-European

linguistics: an introduction . Cambridge
University Press. ISBN 9781139467346.
Ivan G. Iliev (2007) On the Nature of
Grammatical Case ... (Case and
Vocativeness)

Iliev, Iv. The Russian Genitive of

Negation and Its Japanese Counterpart.
International Journal of Russian Studies.
1, 2018

External links
Grammatical Features Inventory – DOI:
10.15126/SMG.18/1.04
World Atlas of Language Structures
Online
Chapter 28: Case Syncretism
Chapter 49: Number of Cases
Chapter 50: Asymmetrical Case
Marking
Chapter 51: Position of Case
Affixes
Chapter 98: Alignment of Case
Marking of Full Noun Phrases
Chapter 99: Alignment of Case
Marking of Pronouns
Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Grammatical_case&oldid=899331353"

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