List of grammatical cases

Template:Short description Template:Redirect Template:More citations needed Template:Use dmy dates This is a list of grammatical cases as they are used by various inflectional languages that have declension.

This list will mark the case, when it is used, an example of it, and then finally what language(s) the case is used in.

Location and movement

Note: Most cases used for location and motion can be used for time as well.

Location

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Adessive case	close	near/at/by the house	Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--ExtLocCases">Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Lezgian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Livonian Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Kven
Antessive case	anterior	before the house	Dravidian languages<ref>S. Agesthialingom, Prakya Sreesaila Subrahmanyam, Dravidian Linguistics- V: (proceedings of the Seminar on Dravidian Linguistics- V), Page 275, 1976 - 582 pages, Google book search link quote: "(6) 'before' (antessive), (7) 'behind, ..."</ref>
Apudessive case<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>	adjacent	next to the house	Tsez
Inessive case	inside	inside the house	Basque Template:Pipe Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--LocalCases">Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Ossetic Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Kven
Intrative case	between	between the houses	Limbu Template:Pipe Quechua
Locative case	location	at/on/in the house	Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Azeri Template:Pipe Bengali Template:Pipe Belarusian Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Chuvash Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Gujarati Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Latin (restricted) Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Manchu Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Quechua Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Slovak Template:Pipe Slovene Template:Pipe Sorbian Template:Pipe Tamil Template:Pipe Telugu Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Uzbek (Note: the case in Slavic languages termed the "locative case" in English is actually a prepositional case.)
Pergressive case	vicinity	in the vicinity of the house	Kamu
Pertingent case	contacting	touching the house	Tlingit Template:Pipe Archi
Postessive case	posterior	after the house	Lezgian Template:Pipe Agul
Subessive case	under	under/below the house	Tsez
Superessive case	on the surface	on (top of) the house	Hungarian Template:Pipe Ossetic Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases">Template:Cite web</ref>

Motion from

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Ablative case	near or inside	away from the house	Albanian Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Azeri Template:Pipe Chuvash Template:Pipe Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Evenki Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--ExtLocCases" /> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Manchu Template:Pipe Ossetic Template:Pipe Quechua Template:Pipe Tamil<ref name="HaroldSchiffman--TamilCases">Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Tibetan Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Uzbek Template:Pipe Yukaghir
Adelative case	the vicinity	from near the house	Lezgian
Delative case	the surface	from (the top of) the house	Hungarian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" />
Egressive case	marking the beginning of a movement or time	beginning from the house	Udmurt
Elative case	the interior	out of the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Evenki Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--LocalCases" /> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Kven
Postelative case	movement from behind	from behind the house	Lezgian

Motion to

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Allative case	in Hungarian and in Finnish: the adjacency in Estonian and in Finnish: the surface	to the house onto the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--ExtLocCases" /> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Tamil<ref name="HaroldSchiffman--TamilCases"/> Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Tuvan Template:Pipe Uzbek Template:Pipe Kven
Illative case	inside	into the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--LocalCases" /> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Tamil<ref name="HaroldSchiffman--TamilCases"/> Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Kven
Lative case	near or inside	to/into the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" /> Template:Pipe Quechua Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Turkish
Sublative case	the surface or below	on(to) the house/under the house	Hungarian Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" />
Superlative case	the top	on(to) the house/on top of the house	Northeast Caucasian languages: Bezhta Template:Pipe Hinuq Template:Pipe Tsez
Terminative case	marking the end of a movement or time	as far as the house	Chuvash Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Quechua

Motion via

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Perlative case	movement through or along	through/along the house	Evenki Template:Pipe Tocharian A & B Template:Pipe Warlpiri Template:Pipe Yankunytjatjara
Prolative case (= prosecutive case, vialis case)	movement using a surface or way	by way of/through the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian (rare) Template:Pipe Finnish (rare)<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" /> Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Greenlandic Template:Pipe Inuktitut

Time

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Ablative case	specifying a time when and within	E.g.: Template:Lang, "at that time"; Template:Lang, "within a few hours".	Latin Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Finnish Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Kven
Accusative case	indicating duration of time known as the accusative of duration of time	E.g.: Template:Lang, "for many years"; Template:Lang, "for 200 years".	Latin Template:Pipe German Template:Pipe Esperanto | Serbian Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Russian | Turkish
Essive case	used for specifying days and dates	E.g.: Template:Lang, "on Monday"; Template:Lang, "on the 6th of December".	Finnish Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Kven
Limitative case	specifying a deadline	E.g.: Template:Lang (Template:Lang) "by 5:30 PM"	Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/>
Temporal case	specifying a time	E.g.: Template:Lang "at seven" or Template:Lang "at seven o'clock"; Template:Lang "at midnight"; Template:Lang "at Christmas".	Hungarian Template:Pipe Finnish (rare)<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" />

Chart for review for the basic cases

	interior	surface	adjacency	state
from	Elative	Delative	Ablative	Exessive
at/in	Inessive	Superessive	Adessive	Essive
(in)to	Illative	Sublative	Allative	Translative
via	Perlative	Prolative

Morphosyntactic alignment

For meanings of the terms agent, patient, experiencer, and instrument, see thematic relation.

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Absolutive case (1)	patient, experiencer; subject of an intransitive verb and direct object of a transitive verb	he pushed the door and it opened	Basque Template:Pipe Tibetan
Absolutive case (2)	patient, involuntary experiencer	he pushed the door and it opened; he slipped	active-stative languages
Absolutive case (3)	patient; experiencer; instrument	he pushed the door with his hand and it opened	Inuktitut
Accusative case (1)	patient	he pushed the door and it opened	Akkadian Template:Pipe Albanian Template:Pipe Arabic Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Azeri Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Erzya Template:Pipe Esperanto Template:Pipe Faroese Template:Pipe Finnish Template:Pipe German Template:Pipe Greek Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Icelandic Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Romanian Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Slovak Template:Pipe Slovene Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe Yiddish
Accusative case (2)	direct object of a transitive verb; made from; about; for a time	I see her	Inuktitut Template:Pipe Persian Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Serbo-Croatian
Agentive case	agent, specifies or asks about who or what; specific agent that is subset of a general topic or subject	it was she who committed the crime; as for him, his head hurts	Japanese,<ref name="tarou_takahashi">Template:Cite book</ref> Mongsen Ao<ref>Template:Citation</ref>
Direct case	direct subject or object of a transitive or intransitive verb	I saw her; I gave her the book.	Scottish Gaelic<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Pipe many languages with Austronesian Alignment.
Ergative case	agent; subject of a transitive verb	he pushed the door and it opened	Basque Template:Pipe Chechen Template:Pipe Dyirbal Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Samoan Template:Pipe Tibetan Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Tsez
Ergative-genitive case	agent, possession	he pushed the door and it opened; her dog	Classic Maya Template:Pipe Inuktitut
Instructive	means, answers question how?	by means of the house	Estonian (rare) Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--MeansCases">Template:Cite web</ref>
Instrumental	instrument, answers question using what?	with the house	Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Belarusian Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Evenki Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Slovak Template:Pipe Slovene Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Yukaghir
Instrumental-comitative case	instrument, in company	with the house	Chuvash Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Tlingit
Nominative case (1)	agent, experiencer; subject of a transitive or intransitive verb	he pushed the door and it opened	nominative–accusative languages (including marked nominative languages)
Nominative case (2)	agent; voluntary experiencer	he pushed the door and it opened; she paused	active languages
Objective case (1)	direct or indirect object of verb	I saw her; I gave her the book.	Bengali Template:Pipe Chuvash
Objective/Oblique (2)	direct or indirect object of verb or object of preposition; a catch-all case for any situation except nominative or genitive	I saw her; I gave her the book; with her.	English Template:Pipe Swedish Template:Pipe Danish Template:Pipe Norwegian Template:Pipe Bulgarian
Oblique case	all-round case; any situation except nominative or vocative	concerning the house	Anglo-NormanTemplate:Citation needed Template:Pipe Hindi Template:Pipe Old French Template:Pipe Old Provençal Template:Pipe Telugu Template:Pipe Tibetan
Intransitive case (also called passive or patient case)	the subject of an intransitive verb or the logical complement of a transitive verb	The door opened	languages of the Caucasus Template:Pipe Ainu
Pegative case	agent in a clause with a dative argument	he gave the book to him	Azoyú Tlapanec

Relation

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Ablative case	all-round indirect case	concerning the house	Albanian Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--ExtLocCases" />
Aversive case	avoiding or fear	avoiding the house	Warlpiri Template:Pipe Yidiny
Benefactive case	for, for the benefit of, intended for	for the house	Basque Template:Pipe Quechua Template:Pipe Telugu
Caritative case	because of presence or absence	for want of a house	Ngiyambaa
Causal case	because, because of	because of the house	Quechua Template:Pipe Telugu
Causal-final case	efficient or final cause	for a house	Chuvash Template:Pipe Hungarian
Comitative case	accompanied with	with the house	Dumi Template:Pipe Ingush Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish (rare)<ref name="PanuMäkinen--MeansCases" /> Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Kven Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Ossetic (only in Iron) Template:Pipe Tibetan
Dative case	shows direction or recipient	for/to the house	Albanian Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Azeri Template:Pipe Belarusian Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Erzya Template:Pipe Faroese Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe German Template:Pipe Ancient Greek Template:Pipe Hindi Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Icelandic Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name=tarou_takahashi/> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Manchu Template:Pipe Ossetic Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Romanian Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Scottish GaelicTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Slovak Template:Pipe Slovene Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Yiddish Template:Note The case classically referred to as dative in Scottish Gaelic has shifted to, and is sometimes called, a prepositional case.
Distributive case	distribution by piece	per house	Chuvash Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases" />
Distributive-temporal case	frequency	daily; on Sundays	Hungarian; Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Advcases"/>
Genitive case	shows generic relationship, generally ownership, but also composition, reference, description, etc.	of the house; the house's	Akkadian Template:Pipe Albanian Template:Pipe Arabic Template:Pipe Armenian (Eastern) Template:Pipe Armenian (Western) Template:Pipe Azeri Template:Pipe Bengali Template:Pipe Belarusian Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Chuvash Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Danish Template:Pipe Dutch Template:Pipe English Template:Pipe Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Faroese Template:Pipe Finnish Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe German Template:Pipe Greek Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Icelandic Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Irish Template:Pipe Japanese<ref name="tarou_takahashi" /> Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Manchu Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Norwegian Template:Pipe Persian<ref>Behrang QasemiZadeh, Saeed Rahimi, Persian in MULTEXT-East Framework, 5th International Conference on NLP, FinTAL 2006 Turku, Finland, August 23–25, 2006 Proceedings</ref> Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Romanian Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Scottish Gaelic Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Slovak Template:Pipe Slovene Template:Pipe Swedish Template:Pipe Tibetan Template:Pipe Tsez Template:Pipe Turkish Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Kven
Ornative case	endowment	equipped with a house	Dumi; Hungarian
Possessed case	passive possession	the house is owned	Tlingit | TurkishTemplate:Ref Template:NoteA sentence with possessed case noun always has to include a possessive case noun.
Possessive case	direct ownership	owned by the house	English Template:Pipe Turkish
Privative case	lacking, without	without a house	Chuvash Template:Pipe Kamu Template:Pipe Martuthunira Template:Pipe Wagiman
Semblative/Similative case	similarity, comparing	that tree is like a house	Wagiman
Sociative case	along with, together with	(together) with the house	Hungarian Template:Pipe Ossetic
Substitutive case	substituting, instead of	instead of him	Archi

Semantics

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Partitive case	used for amounts	three (of the) houses	Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Amount-State-Cases">Template:Cite web</ref> Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Kven
Prepositional case	when prepositions precede the noun	in/on/about the house	BelarusianTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe CzechTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe PolishTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe Russian Template:Pipe Scottish GaelicTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe SlovakTemplate:Ref Template:Pipe UkrainianTemplate:Ref Template:Note This case is called lokál in Czech and Slovak, miejscownik in Polish, місцевий (miscevý) in Ukrainian and месны (miesny) in Belarusian; these names imply that this case also covers locative case. Template:Note The prepositional case in Scottish Gaelic is classically referred to as a dative case.
Vocative case	used for addressing, with or without a preposition	Hey, father! O father! Father!	Albanian (rare) Template:Pipe Belarusian (rare) Template:Pipe Bulgarian Template:Pipe Bosnian Template:Pipe Croatian Template:Pipe Czech Template:Pipe Georgian Template:Pipe Greek Template:Pipe Hindi Template:Pipe Irish Template:Pipe Japanese (literary or poetic) Template:Pipe Scottish Gaelic Template:Pipe Manx Template:Pipe Itelmen Template:Pipe Kashmiri Template:Pipe Ket Template:Pipe Latin Template:Pipe Latvian Template:Pipe Lithuanian Template:Pipe Macedonian Template:Pipe Nivkh Template:Pipe Polish Template:Pipe Romanian Template:Pipe Russian (rare) Template:Pipe Sanskrit Template:Pipe Scottish Gaelic Template:Pipe Serbian Template:Pipe Slovak (rare) Template:Pipe Telugu Template:Pipe Ukrainian Template:Pipe Nahuatl

State

Case	Usage	Example	Found in
Abessive case	lacking	without the house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--MeansCases" /> Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Quechua Template:Pipe Kven
Adverbial case	temporary state	as a house	Georgian Template:Pipe Udmurt Template:Pipe Finnic languages Template:Pipe Abkhaz
Comparative case<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref>	comparison	like the house	Dumi Template:Pipe Mari Template:Pipe Nivkh
Equative case	similarity	similar to the house	Greenlandic Template:Pipe Ossetic Template:Pipe Sumerian Template:Pipe Tlingit Template:Pipe Tsez
Essive case	temporary state of being	as the house	Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Amount-State-Cases" /> Template:Pipe Inari Sámi Template:Pipe Inuktitut Template:Pipe Middle Egyptian Template:Pipe Northern Sámi Template:Pipe Skolt Sámi Template:Pipe Tsez
Essive-formal case	marking a condition as a quality (a kind of shape)	as a house	Hungarian
Essive-modal case	marking a condition as a quality (a way of being)	as a house	Hungarian
Exessive case	marking a transition from a condition	from being a house (i.e., it stops being a house)	Estonian (rare) Template:Pipe Finnish (dialectal)
Formal case	marking a condition as a quality	as a house	Hungarian
Orientative case	positive orientation	turned towards the house	Chukchi
Revertive case	negative orientation	against the house	Manchu
Translative case	change of a condition into another	(turning) into a house	Erzya Template:Pipe Estonian Template:Pipe Finnish<ref name="PanuMäkinen--Amount-State-Cases" /> Template:Pipe Hungarian Template:Pipe Japanese Template:Pipe Khanty Template:Pipe Kven

References

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