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.
Note: Most cases used for location and motion can be used for time as well.
Case | Usage | Example | Found in | |
---|---|---|---|---|
close | near/at/by the house | Estonian | Finnish[1] | Hungarian | Lezgian | Lithuanian | Livonian | Tlingit | Tsez | Kven | ||
anterior | before the house | Dravidian languages[2] | ||
Apudessive case[3] | adjacent | next to the house | Tsez | |
inside | inside the house | Basque | Erzya | Estonian | Lithuanian | Finnish[4] | Hungarian | Ossetic | Tsez | Kven | ||
between | between the houses | Limbu | Quechua | ||
location | at/on/in the house | Armenian (Eastern) | Azeri | Bengali | Belarusian | Bosnian | Chuvash | Croatian | Czech | Gujarati | Hungarian | Inari Sámi | Inuktitut | Japanese | Kashmiri | Latin (restricted) | Latvian | Lithuanian | Manchu | Northern Sámi | Polish | Quechua | Russian | Sanskrit | Serbian | Skolt Sámi | Slovak | Slovene | Sorbian | Tamil | Telugu | Tlingit | Turkish | Ukrainian | 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 | |
contacting | touching the house | Tlingit | Archi | ||
posterior | after the house | Lezgian | Agul | ||
under | under/below the house | Tsez | ||
on the surface | on (top of) the house | Hungarian | Ossetic | Tsez | Finnish[5] |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in | |
---|---|---|---|---|
near or inside | away from the house | Albanian | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Azeri | Chuvash | Erzya | Estonian | Evenki | Finnish | Hungarian | Inuktitut | Japanese | Latin | Manchu | Ossetic | Quechua | Tamil[6] | Sanskrit | Tibetan | Tlingit | Tsez | Turkish | Uzbek | Yukaghir | ||
the vicinity | from near the house | Lezgian | ||
the surface | from (the top of) the house | Hungarian | Finnish | ||
marking the beginning of a movement or time | beginning from the house | Udmurt | ||
the interior | out of the house | Erzya | Estonian | Evenki | Finnish | Hungarian | Kven | ||
Initiative case | starting point of an action | beginning from the house | Manchu | |
movement from behind | from behind the house | Lezgian |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in | |
---|---|---|---|---|
in Hungarian and in Finnish: the adjacency in Estonian and in Finnish: the surface | to the house onto the house | Erzya | Estonian | Finnish | Hungarian | Inuktitut | Japanese | Kashmiri | Lithuanian | Manchu | Tamil | Tlingit | Tsez | Turkish | Tuvan | Uzbek | Kven | ||
inside | into the house | Erzya | Estonian | Finnish | Hungarian | Inari Sámi | Lithuanian | Northern Sámi | Skolt Sámi | Tamil | Tsez | Kven | ||
near or inside | to/into the house | Erzya | Finnish | Quechua | Tsez | Turkish | ||
the surface or below | on(to) the house/under the house | Hungarian | Tsez | Finnish | ||
the top | on(to) the house/on top of the house | Northeast Caucasian languages | ||
marking the end of a movement or time | as far as the house | Chuvash | Estonian | Hungarian | Japanese | Manchu | Quechua |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in |
---|---|---|---|
movement through or along | through/along the house | Evenki | Tocharian A & B | Warlpiri | Yankunytjatjara | |
Prolative case (= prosecutive case, vialis case) | movement using a surface or way | by way of/through the house | Erzya | Estonian (rare) | Finnish (rare) | Tlingit | Greenlandic | Inuktitut |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Ablative case | specifying a time when and within | E.g.: Latin: eō tempore, "at that time"; Latin: paucīs hōrīs, "within a few hours". | Latin | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Finnish | Turkish | Kven | ||
indicating duration of time known as the accusative of duration of time | E.g.: Latin: multos annos, "for many years"; Latin: ducentos annos, "for 200 years". | Turkish | |||
used for specifying days and dates | E.g.: Finnish: maanantaina, "on Monday"; Finnish: kuudentena joulukuuta, "on the 6th of December". | Finnish | Estonian | Kven | |||
Limitative case | specifying a deadline | E.g.: Japanese: 午後5時半までに (Japanese: Gogo go-ji han made-ni) "by 5:30 PM" | Japanese | ||
specifying a time | E.g.: Hungarian: hétkor "at seven" or Hungarian: hét órakor "at seven o'clock"; Hungarian: éjfélkor "at midnight"; Hungarian: karácsonykor "at Christmas". | Hungarian | Finnish (rare) |
interior | surface | adjacency | state | ||
from | Elative | Delative | Ablative | Exessive | |
at/in | Inessive | Superessive | Adessive | Essive | |
(in)to | Illative | Sublative | Allative | Translative | |
via | Perlative | Prolative |
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 | |
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 | Albanian | Arabic | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Azeri | Bosnian | Croatian | Czech | Erzya | Esperanto | Faroese | Finnish | German | Greek | Hungarian | Icelandic | Inari Sámi | Japanese | Latin | Latvian | Lithuanian | Northern Sámi | Polish | Romanian | Russian | Sanskrit | Serbian | Skolt Sámi | Slovak | Slovene | Ukrainian | Georgian | Yiddish |
Accusative case (2) | direct object of a transitive verb; made from; about; for a time | I see her | Inuktitut | Persian | Turkish | Serbo-Croatian |
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[7] | |
Direct case | direct subject or object of a transitive or intransitive verb | I saw her; I gave her the book. | Scottish Gaelic[8] | many languages with Austronesian Alignment. |
agent; subject of a transitive verb | he pushed the door and it opened | Basque | Chechen | Dyirbal | Georgian | Kashmiri | Samoan | Tibetan | Tlingit | Tsez | |
agent, possession | he pushed the door and it opened; her dog | Classic Maya | Inuktitut | |
means, answers question how? | by means of the house | Estonian (rare) | Finnish[9] | |
instrument, answers question using what? | with the house | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Belarusian | Bosnian | Croatian | Czech | Evenki | Georgian | Japanese | Kashmiri | Latvian | Lithuanian | Manchu | Polish | Russian | Sanskrit | Serbian | Slovak | Slovene | Tsez | Ukrainian | Yukaghir | |
instrument, in company | with the house | Chuvash | Hungarian | 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 | 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. | |
all-round case; any situation except nominative or vocative | concerning the house | Anglo-Norman | Hindi | Old French | Old Provençal | Telugu | 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 | Ainu |
agent in a clause with a dative argument | he gave the book to him | Azoyú Tlapanec | |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in |
---|---|---|---|
all-round indirect case | concerning the house | Albanian | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Sanskrit | Inuktitut | Kashmiri | Latin | Lithuanian | Finnish | |
avoiding or fear | avoiding the house | Warlpiri | Yidiny | |
for, for the benefit of, intended for | for the house | Basque | Quechua | Telugu | |
because of presence or absence | for want of a house | Ngiyambaa | |
because, because of | because of the house | ||
efficient or final cause | for a house | Chuvash | Hungarian | |
accompanied with | with the house | Dumi | Ingush | Estonian | Finnish (rare) | Inari Sámi | Japanese | Kashmiri | Kven | Northern Sámi | Skolt Sámi | Ossetic (only in Iron) | Tibetan | |
shows direction or recipient | for/to the house | Albanian | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Azeri | Belarusian | Bosnian | Croatian | Czech | Erzya | Faroese | Georgian | German | Ancient Greek | Hindi | Hungarian | Icelandic | Inuktitut | Japanese | Kashmiri | Latin | Latvian | Lithuanian | Manchu | Ossetic | Polish | Romanian | Russian | Sanskrit | Scottish Gaelic | Serbian | Slovak | Slovene | Tsez | Turkish | Ukrainian | Yiddish The case classically referred to as dative in Scottish Gaelic has shifted to, and is sometimes called, a prepositional case. | |
distribution by piece | per house | Chuvash | Hungarian | Manchu | Finnish | |
frequency | daily; on Sundays | Hungarian | |
shows generic relationship, generally ownership, but also composition, reference, description, etc. | of the house; the house's | Akkadian | Albanian | Arabic | Armenian (Eastern) | Armenian (Western) | Azeri | Bengali | Belarusian | Bosnian | Chuvash | Croatian | Czech | Danish | Dutch | English | Erzya | Estonian | Faroese | Finnish | Georgian | German | Greek | Hungarian | Icelandic | Inari Sámi | Irish | Japanese | Kashmiri | Latin | Latvian | Lithuanian | Manchu | Northern Sámi | Norwegian | Persian[10] | Polish | Romanian | Russian | Sanskrit | Scottish Gaelic | Serbian | Skolt Sámi | Slovak | Slovene | Swedish | Tibetan | Tsez | Turkish | Ukrainian | Kven | |
endowment | equipped with a house | Dumi | |
passive possession | the house is owned | Tlingit | |
direct ownership | owned by the house | English | Turkish | |
lacking, without | without a house | Chuvash | Kamu | Martuthunira | Wagiman | |
similarity, comparing | that tree is like a house | Wagiman | |
along with, together with | (together) with the house | Hungarian | Ossetic | |
Substitutive case | substituting, instead of | instead of him | Archi |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in | |
---|---|---|---|---|
used for amounts | three (of the) houses | Estonian | Finnish[11] | Inari Sámi | Russian | Skolt Sámi | Kven | ||
when prepositions precede the noun | in/on/about the house | Belarusian | Czech | Polish | Russian | Scottish Gaelic | Slovak | Ukrainian 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. | ||
used for addressing, with or without a preposition | Hey, father! O father | Father! | Albanian (rare) | Belarusian (rare) | Bulgarian | Bosnian | Croatian | Czech | Georgian | Greek | Hindi | Irish | Japanese (literary or poetic) | Scottish Gaelic | Manx | Itelmen | Kashmiri | Ket | Latin | Latvian | Lithuanian | Macedonian | Nivkh | Polish | Romanian | Russian (rare) | Sanskrit | Scottish Gaelic | Serbian | Slovak (rare) | Telugu | Ukrainian | Nahuatl | |
Case | Usage | Example | Found in |
---|---|---|---|
lacking | without the house | Erzya | Estonian | Finnish | Inari Sámi | Skolt Sámi | Quechua | Kven | |
temporary state | as a house | Georgian | Udmurt | Finnic languages | Abkhaz | |
comparison | like the house | Dumi | Mari | Nivkh | |
similarity | similar to the house | Greenlandic | Ossetic | Sumerian | Tlingit | Tsez | |
temporary state of being | as the house | Estonian | Finnish | Inari Sámi | Inuktitut | Middle Egyptian | Northern Sámi | Skolt Sámi | Tsez | |
marking a condition as a quality (a kind of shape) | as a house | Hungarian | Manchu | |
marking a condition as a quality (a way of being) | as a house | Hungarian | |
marking a transition from a condition | from being a house (i.e., it stops being a house) | Estonian (rare) | Finnish (dialectal) | |
Formal case | marking a condition as a quality | as a house | Hungarian |
Identical case | showing equality | being the house | Manchu |
positive orientation | turned towards the house | Chukchi | Manchu | |
negative orientation | against the house | Manchu | |
change of a condition into another | (turning) into a house | Erzya | Estonian | Finnish | Hungarian | Japanese | Khanty | Manchu | Kven | |