CASES

Cases are extremely important in Latin. These denote what role a noun plays in a sentence.

There are 6 cases in Latin!

Every noun changes its endings to be a particular case (You can see this in the grammar page on nouns).

Nominative Case

The nominative case refers to the subject of the sentence - the subject is the noun that is doing the verb.

E.g. ‘The girl is playing’ - ‘the girl’ is the subject and thus would be in the nominative case.

There is also a predicate nominative, where a noun or adjective is linked to the subject with the verb esse (to be).

E.g. ‘The slave is a boy’ - not only would the subject ‘slave’ be in the nominative, but also the noun ‘boy’ because it relates to the subject.

Vocative Case

The vocative case is used to address a noun, usually in direct speech.

E.g. ‘Slave, you will help the guest’ - here, the slave is being addressed and thus the vocative case would be used.

Accusative Case

The accusative case refers to the object of a sentence - the object is the noun that the verb is done to.

E.g. ‘I walked the dog’ - ‘the dog’ is the object as it is the thing being walked.

The accusative case can also be used to express duration.

E.g. ‘I walked the dog for one hour’ - ‘one hour’ would be in the accusative case.

Genitive Case

The genitive case is used to show possession, to show who the noun belongs to.

It is often translated with the word ‘of’ in English.

E.g. ‘The daughters of the farmer are laughing’ - ‘the farmer’ would be in the genitive case as they are his daughters!

Dative Case

The dative case is the indirect object of a sentence. The verb is done for the noun in the dative case.

It is often translated with the words ‘to’ or ‘for’.

E.g. ‘The man gave food to the guest.’ - ‘the food’ is the direct object so would be in the accusative case, and ‘the guest’ would be the indirect object so would be in the dative case.

Ablative Case

The ablative case often show how an object is used to complete the action or how something was done (instrumental).

It is often translated with the words ‘by’, ‘with’ or ‘from’.

E.g. I killed the man with a sword - ‘the sword’ would be in the ablative case as it was how the action of killing was done.

The ablative case can also be used to express time when something happened or time within something happened.

E.g. I marched on on the third hour - ‘the third hour’ would be in the ablative case as it shows the time when something happened.

Other uses are of the ablative case are ‘ablative absolutes’ and ‘ablatives of comparisons’ - You can find more on these in their grammar sections!