German cases

Definite & indefinite articles & possessive adjectives

The German case system

When used in a sentence, German nouns and pronouns take cases. The case of a noun or pronoun signifies its function in the sentence, that is, whether it is acting as the subject or an object, or whether it is acting in some other capacity.

There are four cases in German: Nominative, Accusative, Dative, and Genitive. Each case signifies a specific range of functions. To identify the case of a noun, one normally must look at the determiners that precede it, words like the, a, an, this, every, etc. These words are called articles.

Definite articles

You have already seen that the genders of German nouns are typically shown by way of an accompanying definite article: der (masculine), die (feminine), or das (neuter). These are the nominative case forms of the definite articles. When a noun is used in a different case, the form of its definite article may change. No matter the case or the inflected form, the definite article still means the.

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	der Mann	die Frau	das Kind	die Kinder
accusative	den Mann	die Frau	das Kind	die Kinder
dative	dem Mann	der Frau	dem Kind	den Kindern
genitive	des Mannes	der Frau	des Kindes	der Kinder

The plural form of the definite article is identical to the feminine form in the nominative and accusative cases (die). Note that the noun is usually identifiable as either feminine or plural, because the plural noun itself has an altered form:

die Frau (singular) > die Frauen (plural)
die Tochter > die Töchter
die Blume > die Blumen

Also note that there are three instances where a noun itself takes on an ending to help signify its case:

1) Nouns in the dative plural add an -n, unless the plural form already ends in -n or -s.

nominative singular	nominative plural	dative plural
der Mann	die Männer	den Männern
die Mutter	die Mütter	den Müttern
der Freund	die Freunde	den Freunden
die Freundin	die Freundinnen	den Freundinnen
das Auto	die Autos	den Autos

2) Masculine and 3) neuter nouns in the genitive case add an -s or an -es suffix. One-syllable nouns typically add -es. Nouns with more than one syllable just add -s.

der Mann (nominative) > des Mannes (genitive)
der Wagen > des Wagens
das Buch > des Buches
das Telefon > des Telefons

These endings are vestiges of an older system of case inflection in which the nouns themselves altered their suffixes to signify case.

der-words

A number of words behave in their case inflection like the definite articles.

dieser (m), diese (f), dieses (n)	this, these
jeder, jede, jedes	each, every
welcher, welche, welches	which
jener, jene, jenes	that, those
mancher, manche, manches	many
solcher, solche, solches	such

Because these words are declined much like the definite articles, they are often referred to as der-words. The only difference is that in the neuter nominative and accusative, the article ending is -es instead of -as.

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	dieser Mann	diese Frau	dieses Kind	diese Kinder
accusative	diesen Mann	diese Frau	dieses Kind	diese Kinder
dative	diesem Mann	dieser Frau	diesem Kind	diesen Kindern
genitive	dieses Mannes	dieser Frau	dieses Kindes	dieser Kinder

Just like the definite articles, these der-words precede nouns and indicate the case of the accompanying noun.

Indefinite articles or ein-words

Indefinite articles can also precede a noun and specify its case. The indefinite article ein and all of its inflectional variations mean a or an. Because of this, ein cannot be used with the plural form of a noun. Just as one would never say "a books" or "a children" in English, it is neither possible to combine ein or any variation of it with plural forms in German.

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	ein Mann	eine Frau	ein Kind	Kinder
accusative	einen Mann	eine Frau	ein Kind	Kinder
dative	einem Mann	einer Frau	einem Kind	Kindern
genitive	eines Mannes	einer Frau	eines Kindes	Kinder

Although it is unacceptable to use the indefinite article with a plural form, the German article kein, which is inflected similarly to ein and means no, not a, can be and often is combined with plurals.

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	kein Mann	keine Frau	kein Kind	keine Kinder
accusative	keinen Mann	keine Frau	kein Kind	keine Kinder
dative	keinem Mann	keiner Frau	keinem Kind	keinen Kindern
genitive	keines Mannes	keiner Frau	keines Kindes	keiner Kinder

As noted above with respect to definite articles, with indefinite articles, too, do the nouns themselves take endings in the dative plural (-n) and the genitive masculine and neuter (-[e]s).

Possessive adjectives

In addition to the der-words, ein, and kein, the possessive adjectives can also precede a noun and show its case.

mein, meine	my
dein, deine	your (informal, singular)
sein, seine	his, its
ihr, ihre	her, their
unser, unsere	our
euer, eure	your (informal, plural)
Ihr, Ihre	your (formal, singular & plural)

As ein-words, the possessive adjectives follow the same declension pattern as kein.

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	mein Mann	meine Frau	mein Kind	meine Kinder
accusative	meinen Mann	meine Frau	mein Kind	meine Kinder
dative	meinem Mann	meiner Frau	meinem Kind	meinen Kindern
genitive	meines Mannes	meiner Frau	meines Kindes	meiner Kinder

	masculine	feminine	neuter	plural
nominative	ihr Bruder	ihre Schwester	ihr Kind	ihre Geschwister
accusative	ihren Bruder	ihre Schwester	ihr Kind	ihre Geschwister
dative	ihrem Bruder	ihrer Schwester	ihrem Kind	ihren Geschwistern
genitive	ihres Bruders	ihrer Schwester	ihres Kindes	ihrer Geschwister

Whenever the possessive adjective euer has an ending, the final e is dropped and the endings are added to the root eur-: euer Kind (nom. & acc., no ending), but eurem Kind (dat.), eures Kindes (gen.).

Remember that the nouns themselves take endings in the dative plural (-n) and the genitive masculine and neuter (-[e]s) regardless of the article with which the noun is used.

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The cases | Definite articles | Indefinite articles | Possessive adjectives
Nominative case | Accusative case | Dative case | Genitive case
GRAMMAR INDEX

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