The accusative absolute is a

grammatical construction In linguistics, a grammatical construction is any syntactic string of words ranging from sentences over phrasal structures to certain complex lexemes, such as phrasal verbs. Grammatical constructions form the primary unit of study in construction ...

found in some languages. It is an

absolute construction In linguistics, an absolute construction is a grammatical construction standing apart from a normal or usual syntactical relation with other words or sentence elements. It can be a non-finite clause that is subordinate in form and modifies an entire ...

found in the accusative case.

Greek

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

, the accusative case is used

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 ...

ially with

participle In linguistics, a participle () (from Latin ' a "sharing, partaking") is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from ...

s of impersonal verbs, similarly to the

genitive absolute In Ancient Greek grammar, the genitive absolute is a grammatical construction consisting of a participle and often a noun both in the genitive case, which is very similar to the Latin grammar#Ablative absolute, ablative absolute in Latin. A genitiv ...

. For example:

German

In German, a noun phrase can be put in the accusative to indicate that the sentence's subject has the property it describes.Duden 4, ''Die Grammatik'', 5th edition (1995), p. 624 For example: {{interlinear, lang=de, indent=2 , Neben ihm saß der dünnhaarige Pianist, den Kopf im Nacken, und lauschte. , {next to} him sat the thin-haired pianist the-MASC.ACC.SG head {in the} neck and listened , "The thin-haired pianist, his head back ({{lit his head in his neck), sat next to him and listened."

Latin

The accusative absolute is sometimes found in place of the

ablative absolute Latin syntax is the part of Latin grammar that covers such matters as word order, the use of cases, tenses and moods, and the construction of simple and compound sentences, also known as ''periods''. The study of Latin syntax in a systematic way ...

in the

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 of the ...

Late Antiquity Late antiquity is the time of transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, generally spanning the 3rd–7th century in Europe and adjacent areas bordering the Mediterranean Basin. The popularization of this periodization in English ha ...

as, for example, in the writings of Gregory of Tours and

Jordanes Jordanes (), also written as Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th-century Eastern Roman bureaucrat widely believed to be of Gothic descent who became a historian later in life. Late in life he wrote two works, one on Roman history ('' Romana'') a ...

. This likely arose when the pronunciations of the ablative and accusative singulars merged, since the final ''-m'' of the accusative singular was no longer pronounced, having been fading since the Classical era. The accusative absolute is also found with plural nouns whose ablative and accusative are not similar in pronunciation.

Sources

Grammar Greek grammar German grammar