Case: case
| Values: | Abe | Abl | Cau | Com | Cmp | Dat | Ela | Gen | Ill | Ine | Lat | Loc | Nom | Prl | Tem | Tra |
Case is an inflectional feature of nouns and other parts of speech (adjectives, numerals, pronouns, postpositions) that are noun phrase heads.
Case helps specify the role of the noun phrase in the sentence. The various cases have different distributions as basic or indefinite cases (1–16) in relation to their definite singular (3), definite plural (3) and possessive (-12) paradigms.
Erzya morphology distinguishes fifteen cases:
Abe, Abl, Cau, Com, Cmp, Dat, Ela, Gen, Ill, Ine, Lat, Loc, Nom, Prl, Tem, Tra
(this ordering is alphabetical, some authors use different names or even numbers for identifying these cases.)
Abe: abessive
Examples
- [mdf] Пинесь якась азорфтома “The dog walked around without a master”
Abl: ablative
Examples
- [mdf] ярхцась кшида “he or she ate some bread”
Cau: causative
Examples
- [mdf] Стирсь якась вединкса “The girl went after water”
Com: comitative
Examples
- [mdf] Цёранясь банканек грохадсь масторти. “The boy came down with a crash, jar and all.”
Cmp: comparative
Examples
- [mdf] Мольсь чавкань пряшка шура лов. “A snow flakes the size of a rook’s head were falling here and there.”
Dat: dative
Examples
- [mdf] Корхнесть ни Тиманди кудонь путомать колга. “They had already talked to Tima about building a house.”
Ela: elative
Examples
- [mdf] Пяк ашезь нолне сонь кудста. “They really didn’t let her go out of the house”
Gen: genitive
The genitive in Moksha indicates the possessor. It is also one of the morphological markers for direct object and adpositional complement. In the indefinite declension the genitive, when attached to words with material source or origin referents, the resulting form is considered by many grammarians as an adjectival derivation form.
Examples
- [mdf] Тоса кизефтине алязень, мзярда касан. “There I asked my father when I would grow up.”
- [mdf] Валхнень эса марявсь мезень-бди кенярдема. “In the words you could hear a kind of joy.”
Ill: illative
Examples
- [mdf] Мехов ульсь оцю сереc. “Mekhov was big height-wise.”
Ine: inessive
The inessive may be used to express (1) locative state and (2) the instrument function.
Examples
- [mdf] Синь тонафнесть колмоце класса. “They were studying in the third class.”
- [mdf] Лётчикне, улема, кядьса токсесазь коволнятнень. “The pilots, it would seem, touch the little clouds with their hands.”
Lat: lative
Examples
- [mdf] А касан пяк савор, нинге школавга аф якан. “But I’m growing so slowly, I don’t even go to school yet.”
Loc: locative
Examples
- [mdf] Ливозсь шуди сяшкава, бта минь ащеме пизем ала. “Sweat is flowing so much, that it is as if we were in the rain.”
Nom: nominative
The base form, typically used as a citation form (lemma). The nominative form is used in the morphosyntactic funtion of subject and predicate. While the definite declension usually indicates topic (subject) function, the indefinite declension often appears in presentation of new information, such as in existential sentences. Possessor indexing on the nominative allows for both interpretations.
The indefinite nominative singular is one of the complement forms for postpositional constructions; the others being the indefinite and definite genitive forms.
The indefinite nominative singular and plural are used as indefinite object forms; the others being the indefinite and definite genitive forms.
Examples
- [mdf] Синь пикскаса кирдсть оцю тюжя пине “They kept a big brown dog on a rope.”
- [mdf] Вдрук аф ичкозе увазевсь пине. “Suddenly, not far away, a dog began to bark.”
- [mdf] Прважазень пине мархта солдаттнень. “He saw the soldiers off with a dog.”
Prl: prolative
Examples
- [mdf] Иван тись кафта-колма аськолкс коридорнява и лоткась. “Ivan took two or three steps down the corridor and stopped.”
Tem: temporalis
Examples
- [mdf] Эрь кизоня тяса ётафнихть ярмаркат. “Every year they have a market here.”
- [mdf] — Вай, а тинь мезень шкай каннетядязь тяфтама даволне? “– Oh, what god has brought you here in such a storm?”
Tra: transative
Examples
- [mdf] Ялгазе сувась инжикс “My friend came to visit (as a visitor)”
Case in other languages: [am] [apu] [arr] [bej] [bg] [cs] [el] [eme] [en] [es] [ess] [et] [fi] [ga] [gn] [grc] [gub] [hu] [hy] [ka] [kmr] [koi] [kpv] [ky] [mdf] [myu] [myv] [pcm] [pt] [qpm] [ru] [sl] [sv] [tl] [tpn] [tr] [tt] [u] [uk] [urb] [urj]