
In
grammar
In linguistics, the grammar of a natural language is its set of structure, structural constraints on speakers' or writers' composition of clause (linguistics), clauses, phrases, and words. The term can also refer to the study of such constraint ...
, the genitive case (
abbreviated ) is the
grammatical case
A grammatical case is a category of nouns and noun modifiers ( determiners, adjectives, participles, and Numeral (linguistics), numerals), which corresponds to one or more potential grammatical functions for a nominal group in a wording. In va ...
that marks a word, usually a
noun
A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for:
* Organism, Living creatures (including people ...
, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an
attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can also serve purposes indicating other relationships. For example, some
verb
A verb () is a word ( part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descr ...
s may feature
arguments in the genitive case; and the genitive case may also have
adverb An adverb is a word or an expression that generally modifies a verb, adjective, another adverb, determiner, clause, preposition, or sentence. Adverbs typically express manner, place, time, frequency, degree, level of certainty, etc., answering q ...
ial uses (see
adverbial genitive
In grammar, an adverbial genitive is a noun declined in the genitive case that functions as an adverb.
English
In Old and Middle English, the genitive case was productive, and adverbial genitives were commonplace. While Modern English does not ...
).
Genitive construction includes the genitive case, but is a broader category. Placing a modifying noun in the genitive case is one way of indicating that it is related to a
head noun, in a genitive construction. However, there are other ways to indicate a genitive construction. For example, many
Afroasiatic languages
The Afroasiatic languages (or Afro-Asiatic), also known as Hamito-Semitic, or Semito-Hamitic, and sometimes also as Afrasian, Erythraean or Lisramic, are a language family of about 300 languages that are spoken predominantly in the geographic ...
place the head noun (rather than the modifying noun) in the
construct state
In Afro-Asiatic languages, the first noun in a genitive phrase of a possessed noun followed by a possessor noun often takes on a special morphological form, which is termed the construct state (Latin ''status constructus''). For example, in Arab ...
.
Possessive grammatical constructions, including the possessive case, may be regarded as a subset of genitive construction. For example, the genitive construction "
pack of dogs" is similar, but not identical in meaning to the possessive case "dogs' pack" (and neither of these is entirely interchangeable with "dog pack", which is neither genitive nor possessive).
Modern English is an example of a language that has a possessive case rather than a ''conventional'' genitive case. That is, Modern English indicates a genitive construction with either the possessive
clitic suffix "
-", or a
prepositional genitive construction such as "x of y". However, some irregular English pronouns do have possessive forms which may more commonly be described as genitive (see
English possessive). The names of the astronomical constellations have genitive forms which are used in star names, for example the star
Mintaka in the constellation
Orion (genitive Orionis) is also known as Delta Orionis or 34 Orionis.
Many languages have a genitive case, including
Albanian,
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
,
Armenian,
Basque,
Dutch,
Estonian,
Finnish,
Georgian,
German,
Greek
Greek may refer to:
Greece
Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe:
*Greeks, an ethnic group.
*Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family.
**Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...
,
Gothic
Gothic or Gothics may refer to:
People and languages
*Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes
**Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths
**Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...
,
Hungarian,
Icelandic,
Irish,
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...
,
Latvian,
Lithuanian
Lithuanian may refer to:
* Lithuanians
* Lithuanian language
* The country of Lithuania
* Grand Duchy of Lithuania
* Culture of Lithuania
* Lithuanian cuisine
* Lithuanian Jews as often called "Lithuanians" (''Lita'im'' or ''Litvaks'') by other Jew ...
,
Nepali
Nepali or Nepalese may refer to :
Concerning Nepal
* Anything of, from, or related to Nepal
* Nepali people, citizens of Nepal
* Nepali language, an Indo-Aryan language found in Nepal, the current official national language and a language spoken ...
,
Romanian,
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominalization, nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan languages, Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had Trans-cul ...
,
Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well a ...
,
Swedish
Swedish or ' may refer to:
Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically:
* Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland
** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...
,
Kannada
Kannada (; ಕನ್ನಡ, ), originally romanised Canarese, is a Dravidian language spoken predominantly by the people of Karnataka in southwestern India, with minorities in all neighbouring states. It has around 47 million native s ...
,
Tamil,
Telugu
Telugu may refer to:
* Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India
*Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India
* Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language
** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode
S ...
,
Turkish
Turkish may refer to:
*a Turkic language spoken by the Turks
* of or about Turkey
** Turkish language
*** Turkish alphabet
** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation
*** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey
*** Turkish communities and mi ...
and all
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavs, Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic language, Proto ...
except
Bulgarian and
Macedonian
Macedonian most often refers to someone or something from or related to Macedonia.
Macedonian(s) may specifically refer to:
People Modern
* Macedonians (ethnic group), a nation and a South Slavic ethnic group primarily associated with North M ...
.
Functions
Depending on the language, specific varieties of genitive-noun–main-noun relationships may include:
*
possession (''see''
possessive case,
possessed case
A possessive or ktetic form (abbreviated or ; from la, possessivus; grc, κτητικός, translit=ktētikós) is a word or grammatical construction used to indicate a relationship of possession in a broad sense. This can include strict owner ...
):
**
inalienable possession ("''Janet's'' height", "''Janet's'' existence", "''Janet's'' long fingers")
**
alienable possession ("''Janet's'' jacket", "''Janet's'' drink")
** relationship indicated by the noun being modified ("''Janet's'' husband")
* composition (''see''
Partitive):
** substance ("a wheel ''of cheese''")
** elements ("a group ''of men''")
** source ("a portion ''of the food''")
* participation in an action:
** as an
agent ("She benefited from ''her father's'' love") – this is called the ''subjective genitive'' (Compare "Her father loved her", where ''Her father'' is the ''subject''.)
** as a
patient ("the love ''of music''") – this is called the ''objective genitive'' (Compare "She loves music", where ''music'' is the ''object''.)
* origin ("men ''of Rome''")
* reference ("the capital ''of the Republic''" or "''the Republic's'' capital")
* description ("man ''of honour''", "day ''of reckoning''")
* compounds ("''dooms''day" ("doom's day"),
Scottish Gaelic
Scottish Gaelic ( gd, Gàidhlig ), also known as Scots Gaelic and Gaelic, is a Goidelic language (in the Celtic branch of the Indo-European language family) native to the Gaels of Scotland. As a Goidelic language, Scottish Gaelic, as well a ...
"''ball coise''" = "football", where "''coise''" = gen. of "''cas''", "foot")
*
apposition (
Japanese 牛の角 (''ushi no tsuno''), "cow horn")
Depending on the language, some of the relationships mentioned above have their own distinct cases different from the genitive.
Possessive pronouns are distinct pronouns, found in Indo-European languages such as English, that function like pronouns inflected in the genitive. They are considered separate pronouns if contrasting to languages where pronouns are regularly inflected in the genitive. For example, English ''my'' is either a separate
possessive adjective Possessive determiners (from la, possessivus, translit=; grc, κτητικός / ktētikós - en. ktetic
Lallu) are determiners which express possession. Some traditional grammars of English refer to them as possessive adjectives, though they ...
or an irregular genitive of ''I'', while in Finnish, for example, ''minun'' is regularly
agglutinated from ''minu-'' "I" and ''-n'' (genitive).
In some languages, nouns in the genitive case also
agree in case with the nouns they modify (that is, it is marked for two cases). This phenomenon is called
suffixaufnahme
Suffixaufnahme (, "suffix resumption"), also known as case stacking, is a linguistic phenomenon used in forming a genitive construction, whereby prototypically a genitive noun agrees with its head noun. The term Suffixaufnahme itself is literally ...
.
In some languages, nouns in the genitive case may be found in
inclusio
In biblical studies, inclusio is a literary device based on a concentric principle, also known as bracketing or an envelope structure, which consists of creating a frame by placing similar material at the beginning and end of a section, although ...
– that is, between the main noun's
article and the noun itself.
English
Old English had a genitive case, which has left its mark in modern English in the form of the possessive ending s'' (now sometimes referred to as the "Saxon genitive"), as well as possessive adjective forms such as ''his'', ''their'', etc., and in certain words derived from
adverbial genitive
In grammar, an adverbial genitive is a noun declined in the genitive case that functions as an adverb.
English
In Old and Middle English, the genitive case was productive, and adverbial genitives were commonplace. While Modern English does not ...
s such as ''once'' and ''afterwards''. (Other Old English case markers have generally disappeared completely.) The modern English possessive forms are not normally considered to represent a grammatical case, although they are sometimes referred to as genitives or as belonging to a
possessive case. One of the reasons that the status of ''’s'' as a case ending is often rejected is that it does not behave as such, but rather as a clitic marking that indicates that a dependency relationship exists between phrases. One can say ''the King’s war'', but also ''the King of France’s war'', where the genitive marker is attached to the full noun phrase ''the King of France'', whereas case markers are normally attached to the
head of a phrase.
In languages having a true genitive case, such as Old English, this example may be expressed as ''þes cynges wyrre of France'', literally "the King's war of France", with the ''’s'' attaching to ''the King''.
Finnic genitives and accusatives
Finnic languages
The Finnic (''Fennic'') or more precisely Balto-Finnic (Balto-Fennic, Baltic Finnic, Baltic Fennic) languages constitute a branch of the Uralic language family spoken around the Baltic Sea by the Baltic Finnic peoples. There are around 7  ...
(
Finnish,
Estonian, etc.) have genitive cases.
In Finnish, prototypically the genitive is marked with ''-n'', e.g. ''maa – maan'' "country – of the country". The stem may change, however, with
consonant gradation and other reasons. For example, in certain words ending in consonants, ''-e-'' is added, e.g. ''mies – miehen'' "man – of the man", and in some, but not all words ending in ''-i'', the ''-i'' is changed to an ''-e-'', to give ''-en'', e.g. ''lumi – lumen'' "snow – of the snow". The genitive is used extensively, with animate and inanimate possessors. In addition to the genitive, there is also a
partitive case (marked ''-ta/-tä'' or ''-a/-ä'') used for expressing that something is a part of a larger mass, e.g. ''joukko miehiä'' "a group of men".
In Estonian, the genitive marker ''-n'' has elided with respect to Finnish. Thus, the genitive always ends with a vowel, and the singular genitive is sometimes (in a subset of words ending with a vocal in nominative) identical in form to nominative.
In Finnish, in addition to the uses mentioned above, there is a construct where the genitive is used to mark a surname. For example, ''Juhani Virtanen'' can be also expressed ''Virtasen Juhani'' ("Juhani of the Virtanens").
A complication in Finnic languages is that the
accusative case ''-(e)n'' is homophonic to the genitive case. This case does not indicate possession, but is a syntactic marker for the object, additionally indicating that the action is
telic (completed). In
Estonian, it is often said that only a "genitive" exists. However, the cases have completely different functions, and the form of the accusative has developed from *''-(e)m''. (The same sound change has developed into a synchronic mutation of a final ''m'' into ''n'' in Finnish, e.g. genitive ''sydämen'' vs. nominative ''sydän''.) This homophony has exceptions in
Finnish, where a separate accusative ''-(e)t'' is found in pronouns, e.g. ''kenet'' "who (telic object)", vs. ''kenen'' "whose".
A difference is also observed in some of the related
Sámi languages
Sámi languages ( ), in English also rendered as Sami and Saami, are a group of Uralic languages spoken by the Sámi people in Northern Europe (in parts of northern Finland, Norway, Sweden, and extreme northwestern Russia). There are, depend ...
, where the pronouns and the plural of nouns in the genitive and accusative are easily distinguishable from each other, e.g., ''kuä'cǩǩmi'' "eagles' (genitive plural)" and ''kuä'cǩǩmid'' "eagles (accusative plural)" in
Skolt Sami.
German
Formation
Articles
The genitive singular definite article for masculine and neuter nouns is ''des'', while the feminine and plural definite article is ''der''. The indefinite articles are ''eines'' for masculine and neuter nouns, and ''einer'' for feminine and plural nouns (although the bare form cannot be used in the plural, it manifests in ''keiner'', ''meiner'', etc.)
Nouns
Singular masculine and neuter nouns of the strong declension in the genitive case are marked with ''-(e)s''. Generally, one-syllable nouns favour the ''-es'' ending, and it is obligatory with nouns ending with a sibilant such as ''s'' or ''z''. Otherwise, a simple ''-s'' ending is usual. Feminine and plural nouns remain uninflected:
* (of the contribution) – masculine
* (of the flower) – feminine
* (of the country) – neuter
* (of the trees) – plural
Singular masculine nouns (and one neuter noun) of the weak declension are marked with an ''-(e)n'' (or rarely ''-(e)ns'') ending in the genitive case:
* (of the raven) – masculine
* (of the heart) – neuter
Adjectives
The declension of adjectives in the genitive case is as follows:
Personal pronouns
The genitive personal pronouns are quite rare and either very formal, literary or outdated. They are as follows (with comparison to the nominative pronouns):
Some examples:
* (Would you go instead ''of me''?)
* (We are not worthy ''of her/them'')
* (I will commemorate ''you'')
Relative pronouns
Unlike the personal ones, the genitive relative pronouns are in regular use and are as follows (with comparison to the nominative relative pronouns):
Some examples:
* '' Kennst du den Schüler, dessen Mutter eine Hexe ist?'' (Do you know the student ''whose'' mother is a witch?) – masculine
* ''Sie ist die Frau, deren Mann Rennfahrer ist'' (She is the woman ''whose'' husband is a racer) – feminine
Usage
Nouns
The genitive case is often used to show possession or the relation between nouns:
*die Farbe ''des'' ''Himmels'' (the colour ''of the'' ''sky'')
*Deutschland liegt im Herzen ''Europas'' (Germany lies in the heart ''of Europe'')
*der Tod ''seiner Frau'' (the death ''of his wife'')
*die Entwicklung ''dieser Länder'' (the development ''of these countries'')
A simple ''s'' is added to the end of a name:
*''Claudias'' Buch (''Claudia's'' book)
Prepositions
The genitive case is also commonly found after certain prepositions:
* innerhalb ''eines Tages'' (within ''a day'')
* statt ''des'' ''Hemdes'' (instead ''of the shirt'')
* während ''unserer'' ''Abwesenheit'' (during ''our absence'')
* jenseits ''der Berge'' (beyond ''the mountains'')
Adjectives
The genitive case can sometimes be found in connection with certain adjectives:
* Wir sind uns ''dessen'' bewusst (We are aware ''of that'')
* Er ist ''des Diebstahls'' schuldig (He is guilty ''of theft'')
* Das Kind ist ''der Ruhe'' bedürftig (The child is in need ''of calmness'')
* Ich werde ''dieses Lebens'' überdrüssig (I am growing weary ''of this life'')
Verbs
The genitive case is occasionally found in connection with certain verbs (some of which require an accusative before the genitive); they are mostly either formal or legal:
* Die Stadt erfreut sich ''eines günstigen Klimas'' (The city enjoys ''a favourable climate'')
* Gedenken Sie ''der Toten'' des Krieges (Remember ''those who died'' in (the) war)
* Wer klagte ihn ''des Mordes'' an? (Who accused him ''of murder''?)
* Man verdächtigt euch ''des Betrugs'' (Someone suspects you ''of (committing) fraud'')
Greek
The
ablative case of Indo-European was absorbed into the genitive in Classical Greek. This added to the usages of the "genitive proper", the usages of the "ablatival genitive". The genitive occurs with verbs, adjectives, adverbs and prepositions.
Hungarian
The
Hungarian genitive is constructed using the suffix ''-é''.
*''madár'' ('bird'); ''madáré'' ('bird's')
The genitive ''-é'' suffix is only used with the predicate of a sentence: it serves the role of mine, yours, hers, etc. The possessed object is left in the nominative case. For example:
*''A csőr a madáré'' ('The beak is the bird's').
If the possessor is not the predicate of the sentence, the genitive is not used. Instead, the possessive suffixes (''-(j)e'' or ''-(j)a'' in the third person singular, depending on
vowel harmony
In phonology, vowel harmony is an assimilatory process in which the vowels of a given domain – typically a phonological word – have to be members of the same natural class (thus "in harmony"). Vowel harmony is typically long distance, me ...
) mark the possessed object. The possessor is left in the nominative if it directly precedes the possessed object (otherwise it takes a dative ''-nak/-nek'' suffix). For example:
*''csőr'' ('beak'); ''csőre'' ('its beak')
*''a madár csőre''/''csőre a madárnak'' ('the bird's beak')
In addition, the suffix ''-i'' ('of') is also used. For example:
*''madár'' ('bird'); ''madári'' ('avian', 'of bird(s)')
Japanese
The
Japanese possessive is constructed by using the
grammatical particle ''no'' の to make the genitive case. For example:
:Nominative: 猫 ''neko'' ('cat'); 手 ''te'' ('hand, paw')
:Genitive: 猫の手 ''neko-no te'' ('cat's paw')
It also uses the suffix ''-na'' 〜な for
adjectival noun; in some analyses adjectival nouns are simply nouns that take ''-na'' in the genitive, forming a
complementary distribution (''-no'' and ''-na'' being
allomorphs).
The archaic genitive case particle ''-ga'' ~が is still retained in certain expressions, place names, and dialects. Possessive ''ga'' can also be written as a
small ke
The small ''ke'' () is a Japanese character, typographically a small form of the katakana character ''ke''.
While identical in shape to a small , is actually an abbreviation for the kanji , specifically by writing half of the bamboo radical ( ...
(), for example in .
Typically, languages have nominative case nouns converting into genitive case. It has been found, however, that the
Kansai dialect of Japanese will in rare cases allow accusative case to convert to genitive, if specific conditions are met in the clause in which the conversion appears. This is referred to as "Accusative-Genitive conversion."
Latin
The genitive is one of the cases of nouns and pronouns in
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power ...
. Latin genitives still have certain modern scientific uses:
*
Scientific names of living things sometimes contain genitives, as in the plant name ''
Buddleja davidii'', meaning "David's buddleia". Here ''davidii'' is the genitive of ''Davidius'', a
Latinized version of the Hebrew name. It is not capitalized because it is the second part of a binomial name.
*Names of astronomical constellations are Latin, and the genitives of their names are used in naming objects in those constellations, as in the
Bayer designation of stars. For example, the brightest star in the constellation
Virgo is called ''Alpha Virginis'', which is to say "Alpha of Virgo", as ''virginis'' is the genitive of ''virgō''. Note that plural forms and adjectives also decline accordingly: plural ''Alpha Piscium'' (
Pisces
Pisces may refer to:
* Pisces, an obsolete (because of land vertebrates) taxonomic superclass including all fish
*Pisces (astrology), an astrological sign
*Pisces (constellation), a constellation
**Pisces Overdensity, an overdensity of stars in t ...
) and ''Alpha Canum Venaticorum'' (
Canes Venatici) versus singular ''Alpha Piscis Austrini'' (
Piscis Austrinus) and ''Alpha Canis Majoris'' (
Canis Major). Astronomy manuals often list the genitive forms, as some are easy to get wrong even with a basic knowledge of Latin, e.g.
Vela
Vela or Velas may refer to:
Astronomy
* Vela (constellation), a constellation in the southern sky (the Sails)
** Vela (Chinese astronomy)
** Vela Pulsar
** Vela X-1, a pulsing, eclipsing high-mass X-ray binary system
Places
* Vela Bluff, Antarc ...
, which is a neuter plural not a feminine singular: ''Delta Velorum'' not *''Delta Velae''.
* ''
Modus operandi'', which can be translated to English as "mode of operation", in which ''operandi'' is a singular genitive
gerund
In linguistics, a gerund ( abbreviated ) is any of various nonfinite verb forms in various languages; most often, but not exclusively, one that functions as a noun. In English, it has the properties of both verb and noun, such as being modifi ...
(i.e. "of operation"), not a plural of ''operandus'' as is sometimes mistakenly assumed.
Irish
The
Irish language
Irish (an Caighdeán Oifigiúil, Standard Irish: ), also known as Gaelic, is a Goidelic languages, Goidelic language of the Insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, which is a part of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European lang ...
also uses a genitive case (''tuiseal ginideach''). For example, in the phrase ''bean an tí'' (woman of the house), ''tí'' is the genitive case of ''teach'', meaning "house". Another example is ''barr an chnoic'', "top of the hill", where ''cnoc'' means "hill", but is changed to ''chnoic'', which also incorporates
lenition.
Mandarin
In
Mandarin Chinese
Mandarin (; ) is a group of Chinese (Sinitic) dialects that are natively spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. The group includes the Beijing dialect, the basis of the phonology of Standard Chinese, the official language ...
, the genitive case is made by use of the particle 的 (de).
However, about persons in relation to oneself, 的 is often dropped when the context allows for it to be easily understood.
Persian
Old Persian
Old Persian is one of the two directly attested Old Iranian languages (the other being Avestan) and is the ancestor of Middle Persian (the language of Sasanian Empire). Like other Old Iranian languages, it was known to its native speakers as ( ...
had a true genitive case inherited from
Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo- ...
. By the time of
Middle Persian
Middle Persian or Pahlavi, also known by its endonym Pārsīk or Pārsīg () in its later form, is a Western Middle Iranian language which became the literary language of the Sasanian Empire. For some time after the Sasanian collapse, Middle Per ...
, the genitive case had been lost and replaced by an analytical construction which is now called
Ezāfe. This construction was inherited by
New Persian
New Persian ( fa, فارسی نو), also known as Modern Persian () and Dari (), is the current stage of the Persian language spoken since the 8th to 9th centuries until now in Greater Iran and surroundings. It is conventionally divided into thre ...
, and was also later borrowed into numerous other
Iranic,
Turkic
Turkic may refer to:
* anything related to the country of Turkey
* Turkic languages, a language family of at least thirty-five documented languages
** Turkic alphabets (disambiguation)
** Turkish language, the most widely spoken Turkic language
* ...
and
Indo-Aryan languages of Western and South Asia.
Semitic languages
Genitive case marking existed in
Proto-Semitic,
Akkadian Akkadian or Accadian may refer to:
* Akkadians, inhabitants of the Akkadian Empire
* Akkadian language, an extinct Eastern Semitic language
* Akkadian literature, literature in this language
* Akkadian cuneiform, early writing system
* Akkadian myt ...
, and
Ugaritic. It indicated possession, and it is preserved today only in
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
.
Akkadian
:Nominative: ''šarrum'' (king)
:Genitive: ''aššat šarrim'' (wife of king = king's wife)
Arabic
Called المجرور ''al-majrūr'' (meaning "dragged") in
Arabic
Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
, the genitive case functions both as an indication of ownership (ex. the door of the house) and for nouns following a preposition.
:Nominative: ٌبيت ''baytun'' (a house)
:Genitive: ٍبابُ بيت ''bābu baytin'' (door of a house) ِبابُ البيت ''bābu l-bayti'' (door of the house)
The Arabic genitive marking also appears after prepositions.
:e.g. ٍبابٌ لبيت ''bābun li-baytin'' (a door for a house)
The Semitic genitive should not be confused with the pronominal possessive suffixes that exist in all the Semitic languages
:e.g. Arabic بيتي ''bayt-ī'' (my house) َكتابُك ''kitābu-ka'' (your
asc.book).
Slavic languages
With the exception of Bulgarian and Macedonian, all
Slavic languages
The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavs, Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic language, Proto ...
decline the nouns and adjectives in accordance with the genitive case using a variety of endings depending on the word's
lexical category, its gender, number (singular or plural) and in some cases meaning.
Possessives
To indicate possession the ending of the noun indicating the possessor changes depending on the word's ending in the
nominative case.
For example, to ''a, u, i or y'' in
Polish, ''а, я, ы or и'' in
Russian, ''а, я, y, ю, і, и or ей'' in
Ukrainian, and similar cases in other Slavic languages.
:Nominative: (pol.) "Oto Anton" / (rus.) "Вот Антон" / (ukr.) "Ось Антон" ("Here is Anton").
:Genitive: (pol.) "Oto obiad Antonа" / (rus.) "Вот обед Антона" / (ukr.) "Ось oбід Антона" ("Here is Anton's lunch").
Possessives can also be formed by the construction (pol.) "u
ubjectjest
bject / (rus.) "У
ubjectесть
bject/ (ukr.) "у(в)
ubjectє
bject
:Nominative: (pol.) "Oto Anton" / (rus.) "Вот Антон" / (ukr.) "Ось Антон" ("Here is Anton").
:Genitive: (pol.) "u Antonа jest obiad / (rus.) "У Антона есть обед" / (ukr.) "У(В) Антона є обід" ("Anton has a lunch", literally: "(There) is a lunch at Anton's").
In sentences where the possessor includes an associated pronoun, the pronoun also changes:
:Nominative: (pol.) Oto mój brat / (rus.) "Вот мой брат"/ (ukr.) "От мій брат" ("Here is my brother").
:Genitive: (pol.) "u mojego bratа jest obiad / (rus.) "У моего брата есть обед" / (ukr.) "У мого брата є обід" ("My brother has a lunch", literally: "(There) is a lunch at my_brother's").
And in sentences denoting negative possession, the ending of the object noun also changes:
:Nominative: (pol.) "Oto Irena" / (rus.) "Вот Ирена" / (ukr.) "От Ірена" ("Here is Irene").
:Genitive: (pol.) "Irena nie ma obiadu ("Irene does not have a lunch") or (pol.) "u Ireny nie ma obiadu ("(There) is no lunch at Irene's")
Note that the Polish phrase "nie ma
bject can work both as a negation of having
bjector a negation of an existence of
bject
but the meaning of the two sentences and its structure is different. (In the first case
ubjectis Irene, and in the second case
ubjectis virtual, it is "the space" at Irene's place, not Irene herself)
:Genitive: (rus.) "У Ирены нет обеда" ("Irene does not have a lunch", literally: "(There) is no lunch at Irene's").
Note that the Russian word "нет" is a contraction of "не" + "есть".
In Russian there is no distinction between
ubjectnot having an
bjectand
bjectnot being present at
ubjects.
:Genitive: (ukr.) "Ірена не має обіду ("Irene does not have a lunch") or (ukr.) "y Ірени нема(є) обіду ("At Irene's does not have a lunch")
Note the difference between the spelling "не має
bject and "нема(є)
bject in both cases.
To express negation
The genitive case is also used in sentences expressing negation, even when no possessive relationship is involved. The ending of the subject noun changes just as it does in possessive sentences. The genitive, in this sense, can only be used to negate nominative, accusative and genitive sentences, and not other cases.
:Nominative: (pol.) "(Czy) Maria jest w domu?" / (rus.) "Мария дома?" / (Чи) Марія (є) вдома? ("Is Maria at home?").
:Genitive: (pol.) "Marii nie ma w domu" ("Maria is not at home", literally: "
irtual subjecthas no Maria at home")
:Genitive: (rus.) "Марии нет дома" ("Maria is not at home", literally: "Of Maria there is none at home.").
:Genitive: (ukr.) "Марії нема(є) вдома" ("Maria is not at home", literally: "
irtual subjecthas no Maria at home.")
:Accusative: (pol.) "Mogę rozczytać twoje pismo" / (rus.) Могу (про)читать твой почерк / (ukr.) Можу (про)читати твій почерк ("I can read your handwriting")
:Genitive: (pol.) "Nie mogę rozczytać twojego pisma" / (rus.) "Не могу (про)читать твоего почерка" / (ukr.) "Не можу (про)читати твого почерку" ("I can't read your handwriting")
Use of genitive for negation is obligatory in
Slovene,
Polish and
Old Church Slavonic. Some East Slavic languages ( e.g.
Russian and
Belorussian) employ either the accusative or genitive for negation, although the genitive is more commonly used. In
Czech,
Slovak and
Serbo-Croatian
Serbo-Croatian () – also called Serbo-Croat (), Serbo-Croat-Bosnian (SCB), Bosnian-Croatian-Serbian (BCS), and Bosnian-Croatian-Montenegrin-Serbian (BCMS) – is a South Slavic language and the primary language of Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia an ...
, negating with the genitive case is perceived as rather archaic and the accusative is preferred, but genitive negation in these languages is still not uncommon, especially in music and literature.
Partial direct object
The genitive case is used with some verbs and
mass nouns to indicate that the action covers only a part of the direct object (having a function of non-existing partitive case), whereas similar constructions using the
Accusative case denote full coverage. Compare the sentences:
:Genitive: (pol.) "Napiłem się wody" / (rus.) "Я напился воды" / (ukr.) "Я напився води" ("I drank water," i.e. "I drank some water, part of the water available")
:Accusative: (pol.) "Wypiłem wodę" / (rus.) "Я выпил воду / (ukr.) "Я випив воду ("I drank the water," i.e. "I drank all the water, all the water in question")
In Russian, special
partitive case or sub-case is observed for some uncountable nouns which in some contexts have preferred alternative form on -у/ю instead of standard genitive on -а/я: выпил чаю ('drank some tea'), but сорта чая ('sorts of tea').
Prepositional constructions
The genitive case is also used in many prepositional constructions. (Usually when some movement or change of state is involved, and when describing the source / destination of the movement. Sometimes also when describing the manner of acting.)
*Czech prepositions using genitive case: od (from), z, ze (from), do (into), bez (without), kromě (excepting), místo (instead of), podle (after, according to), podél (along), okolo (around), u (near, by), vedle (beside), během (during), pomocí (using, by the help of), stran (as regards) etc.
*Polish prepositions using genitive case: od (from), z, ze (from), do, w (into), na (onto), bez (without), zamiast (instead of), wedle (after, according to), wzdłuż (along), około (around), u (near, by), koło (beside), podczas (during), etc.
*Russian prepositions using genitive case: от (from), с, со (from), до (before, up to), без (without), кроме (excepting), вместо (instead of), после (after), вдоль (along), около (around), у (near, by), во время (during), насчёт (regarding), etc.
Turkish
The
Turkish
Turkish may refer to:
*a Turkic language spoken by the Turks
* of or about Turkey
** Turkish language
*** Turkish alphabet
** Turkish people, a Turkic ethnic group and nation
*** Turkish citizen, a citizen of Turkey
*** Turkish communities and mi ...
genitive, formed with a genitive suffix for the possessor, is used in combination with a possessive for the possessed entity, formed with a
possessive suffix. For example, in "my mother's mother", the possessor is "my mother", and the possessed entity is "
ermother". In Turkish:
:Nominative: ''anne'' ("mother");
:First-person possessive: ''annem'' ("my mother");
:Third-person possessive: ''annesi'' ("
omeones mother");
:Genitive of ''annem'': ''annemin'' ("my mother's");
:Genitive and possive combined: ''annemin annesi'' ("my mother's mother", i.e., "my maternal grandmother").
Albanian
The genitive in
Albanian is formed with the help of clitics. For example:
:Nominative: ''libër'' ('book'); ''vajzë'' ('girl');
:Genitive: ''libri i vajzës'' (the girl's book)
If the possessed object is masculine, the clitic is ''i''. If the possessed object is feminine, the clitic is ''e''. If the possessed object is plural, the clitic is ''e'' regardless of the gender.
The genitive is used with some prepositions: ''me anë'' ('by means of'), ''nga ana'' ('on behalf of', 'from the side of'), ''për arsye'' ('due to'), ''për shkak'' ('because of'), ''me përjashtim'' ('with the exception of'), ''në vend'' ('instead of').
Dravidian languages
Kannada
In Kannada, the genitive case-endings are:
for masculine or feminine nouns ending in "ಅ" (a): ನ (na)
* Examples: ''sūrya-na'' ('of the sun')
for neuter nouns ending in "ಅ" (a): ದ (da)
* Examples: ''mara-da'' ('of the tree')
for all nouns ending in "ಇ" (i), "ಈ" (ī), "ಎ" (e), or "ಏ" (ē): ಅ (a)
* Examples: ''mane-y-a'' ('of the house'; note that a linking "y" is added between the stem and the suffix)
for all nouns ending in "ಉ" (u), "ಊ" (ū), "ಋ" (r̥), or "ೠ" (r̥̄): ಇನ (ina)
* Examples; ''guru-v-ina'' ('of the teacher'; note that a linking "v" is added between the stem and the suffix)
Most postpositions in Kannada take the genitive case.
Tamil
In Tamil, the genitive case ending is the word உடைய or இன், which signifies possession. Depending on the last letter of the noun, the genitive case endings may vary.
If the last letter is a consonant (மெய் எழுத்து), like க், ங், ச், ஞ், ட், ண், த், ந், ப், ம், ய், ர், ல், வ், ழ், then the suffix உடைய/இன் gets added. *Examples: His: அவன் + உடைய = அவனுடைய, Doctor's: மருத்துவர் + உடைய = மருத்துவருடைய, மருத்துவர் + இன் = மருத்துவரின் Kumar's: குமார் + உடைய = குமாருடைய, குமார்+ இன் = குமாரின்
See also
*
Genitive construction
*
Possessive case
References
Further reading
*
*
External links
German genitive caseA lesson covering the genitive case in the German language
*Russian genitive
Genitive Case In Arabic
{{DEFAULTSORT:Genitive Case
Grammatical cases
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