The allative case ( ;

abbreviated An abbreviation () is a shortened form of a word or phrase, by any method including shortening, contraction, initialism (which includes acronym), or crasis. An abbreviation may be a shortened form of a word, usually ended with a trailing per ...

; from

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

''allāt-'', ''afferre'' "to bring to") is a type of locative

grammatical case A grammatical case is a category of nouns and noun modifiers (determiners, adjectives, participles, and Numeral (linguistics), numerals) that corresponds to one or more potential grammatical functions for a Nominal group (functional grammar), n ...

. The term allative is generally used for the

lative case In grammar, the lative ( ; abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which indicates motion to a location. It corresponds to the English prepositions "to" and "into". The lative case belongs to the group of the general local cases together with the loc ...

for the majority of languages that do not make finer distinctions.

Finnish

For the

Finnish language Finnish (endonym: or ) is a Finnic languages, Finnic language of the Uralic languages, Uralic language family, spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. Finnish is one of the two official langu ...

(a Uralic language), the allative is the fifth of the locative cases, with the basic meaning of "onto". Its ending is ''-lle'', for example ''pöytä'' (table) and ''pöydälle'' (onto the top of the table). In addition, it is the logical complement of the adessive case for referring to "being around the place". For example, ''koululle'' means "to the vicinity of the school". With time, the use is the same: ''ruokatunti'' (lunch break) and ''... lähti ruokatunnille'' ("... left to the lunch break"). Some actions require the case, e.g. ''kävely'' - ''mennä kävelylle'' "a walk - go for a walk". It also means "to" or "for", for example ''minä'' (me) and ''minulle'' (to/for me). The other locative cases in Finnish and Estonian are these: *

Inessive case In grammar, the inessive case ( abbreviated ; from "to be in or at") is a locative grammatical case. This case carries the basic meaning of "in": for example, "in the house" is in Finnish, in Estonian, () in Moksha, in Basque, in Lithu ...

("in") * Elative case ("out of") * Illative case ("into") * Adessive case ("on") *

Ablative case In grammar, the ablative case (pronounced ; list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a grammatical case for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives in the grammars of various languages. It is used to indicate motion away from something, make ...

("from off")

Baltic languages

For the Lithuanian and

Latvian language Latvian (, ), also known as Lettish, is an East Baltic languages, East Baltic language belonging to the Indo-European language family. It is spoken in the Baltic region, and is the language of the Latvians. It is the official language of Latvia ...

s, the allative had been used dialectally as an innovation since

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. No direct record of Proto-Indo-European exists; its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-Euro ...

, but it is almost out of use in modern times. Its ending in Lithuanian is ''-op'' which was shortened from ''-opi'', whereas its ending in Latvian is ''-up''. For the modern languages the remains of the allative can be found in certain fixed expressions that have become

adverb An adverb is a word or an expression that generally modifies a verb, an adjective, another adverb, a determiner, a clause, a preposition, or a sentence. Adverbs typically express manner, place, time, frequency, degree, or level of certainty by ...

s, such as Lithuanian ''išėjo Dievop'' ("gone to God", i.e. died), ''velniop!'' ("to the devil" i.e. to hell), ''nuteisti myriop'' (" sentence to death"), ''rudeniop'' ("towards autumn"), ''vakarop'' ("towards the evening"), Latvian ''mājup'' ("towards home"), ''kalnup'' ("uphill"), ''lejup'' ("downhill").

Greek

For

Mycenaean Greek Mycenaean Greek is the earliest attested form of the Greek language. It was spoken on the Greek mainland and Crete in Mycenaean Greece (16th to 12th centuries BC). The language is preserved in inscriptions in Linear B, a script first atteste ...

, an ending ''-de'' is used to denote an allative, when it is not being used as an enclitic, e.g. ''te-qa-de'', *''Tʰēgʷasde'', "to Thebes" (

Linear B Linear B is a syllabary, syllabic script that was used for writing in Mycenaean Greek, the earliest Attested language, attested form of the Greek language. The script predates the Greek alphabet by several centuries, the earliest known examp ...

: ). This ending survives into

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

in words such as ''Athḗnaze'', from accusative ''Athḗnās'' + ''-de''.

Latin

The

accusative case is used for motion towards towns and small islands in a manner that is analogous to the allative case.

Udmurt

For the Udmurt language, words inflected with the allative (often termed "approximative" for Permic languages) case ending "-лань" /ɫɑɲ/ express the direction of a movement.

Hebrew

In Biblical Hebrew (more common in Classical Biblical Hebrew than in Late Biblical Hebrew) the "directional '' he''", "locative ''he''" or ''he locale'', in the form of /-ɔh/ suffixed to nouns (often place names) also functions as an allative marker, usually translated as 'to' or 'toward'.Waltke, Bruce, and Michael O'Connor, ''Introduction to Biblical Hebrew Syntax'' (Winonana Lake, IN: Eisenbrauns, 1990), 185-86. The directional ''he'' appears in later phases of the Hebrew language in expressions such as (upwards) and (homeward).

Wanyi

Wanyi, an endangered Australian language, has the allative suffixes '
kurru/wurru
'.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Allative Case Grammatical cases