TIL

Nouns

nouns.htm

by U Kyaw Tun, M.S. (I.P.S.T., U.S.A.). Not for sale. Prepared for students of TIL Computing and Language Center, Yangon, MYANMAR.
based primarily on:
• An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera, in English  www.buddhanet.net/pdf_file/ele_pali.pdf 080721
• Gray's First Pali Grammar for Myanmar schools, British Burma Press, Rangoon, 1918, pp69, hard cover, in Burmese-Myanmar

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Pali-index pal-indx

Contents of this page
Gender
Case
Declension of nouns
  Nouns ending in [a] {a.}
  Nouns ending in [ā]

UKT Notes
• case

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Gender

There are three genders in Pali. As a rule males and those things possessing male characteristics are in the masculine gender, e.g.,

nara  -- <man>; {na.ra.} UHS-PaliDict0509;  nara PTS-Dict347
suriya  -- <sun>; {thu.ri.ya.} UHS-PaliDict1058; suriya PTS-Dict720
   (compare with <bravery>: {thu-ri.ya.}  UHS-PaliDict1065; sūriya PTS-Dict722)
gāma  -- <village>; {ga-ma.} UHS-PaliDict0363; gāma PTS-Dict249

Females and those things possessing female characteristics are in the feminine gender, e.g.,

itthi -- <woman>; {AIt~hti.} / {ait-hti.}/ UHS-PaliDict0193; itthi PTS-Dict120
gangā  -- <river>; {gïn~ga} UHS-Pali0352;

Neutral nouns and most inanimate things are in the neuter gender, e.g.,

phala  -- <fruit> ;  {hpa.la.} UHS-PaliDict0694; phala PTS-Dict477
citta  -- <mind> ; {sait~ta.} UHS-PaliDict0389; citta PTS-Dict266

UKT: Though Ashin Narada stated: "As a rule males and those things possessing male characteristics are in the masculine gender", generally, gender in a language does not reflect sex. The following is on the French language from: http://french.about.com/library/begin/bl_nouns.htm 080801

A noun is a word that represents a thing, whether that thing is concrete (e.g., a chair, a dog) or abstract (an idea, happiness).
   In French, all nouns have a gender - they are either masculine or feminine. It is very important to learn a noun's gender along with the noun itself because articles, adjectives, and some verbs have to agree with nouns; that is, they change depending on the gender of the noun they precede or follow. The gender of some nouns makes sense (homme [man] is masculine, femme [woman] is feminine) but others don't (personne [person] is always feminine, even if the person is a man!) The best way to learn the gender of nouns is to make your vocabulary lists with the definite or indefinite article. That is, 
  un livre = book
  une chaise = chair

UKT: Myanmars are lucky: Myanmar language has no gender. Ashin Narada stated: "It is not so easy to distinguish the gender in Pali as in English."

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Case

This section is based on: http://www.learnenglish.de/Level1/GrammarText/CASETEXT.htm
See also case in my notes.

Case is the grammatical function of a noun or pronoun. The three cases in modern English are:
1. subjective or nominative <he>
2. objective or accusative <him>
3. possessive or genitive <his>.
See table below for more. There is no dative case in modern English.

First though the good news. You cannot really go wrong here, we have shed most of our cases and as a result English is easier than many other languages because nouns and some indefinite pronouns (anyone, someone, everyone, and so on) only have a distinctive case form for the possessive. However, a remnant of old English is that pronouns have distinctive forms in all three cases and must be used with care.

The personal pronouns, and who and its compounds, are the only words that are inflected in all three cases (subjective, objective, possessive). In nouns the first two cases (subjective and objective) are indistinguishable, and are called the common case. One result of this simplicity is that, the sense of case being almost lost, the few mistakes that can be made are made often, even by native speakers — some of them so often that they are now almost right by prescription.

This section is based on:
• http://www.geocities.com/derekacameron/pali.html
• An Elementary Pali Course, by Ashin Narada

Pali is an inflected language. The grammatical function of nouns is indicated by case endings rather than (as in English) by prepositions or word order. Pali distinguishes between eight cases. Case endings vary according to the stem of the noun in question. There are 8 cases in Pali.

1. [pathamā] <first>
nominative abbr. nom. also known as subjective abbr. subj. case
• Direct subject
• Grammar Of, relating to, or belonging to a case of the subject of a finite verb (as I in I wrote the letter ) and of words identified with the subject of a copula, such as a predicate nominative (as children in These are his children ). -- AHTD

2. [dutiyā] <second>
accusative abbr. acc. also known as objective abbr. obj. case.
•  Direct object
• Grammar Of, relating to, or being the case of a noun, pronoun, adjective, or participle that is the direct object of a verb or the object of certain prepositions. -- AHTD

3. [tatiyā] <third>
instrumental abbr. inst. [karana]
• (by - )
• Grammar Of or designating a case used typically to express means, agency, or accompaniment. 5. Of or relating to instrumentalism. -- AHTD

4. [catutthi] <fourth>
dative abbr. dat.
• (to - )
• Grammar adj. 1. Of, relating to, or being the grammatical case that in some Indo-European languages, such as Latin and Russian, as well as in some non-Indo-European languages, marks the recipient of action and is used with prepositions or other function words corresponding in meaning to English to and for.  -- AHTD

5. [pañcamī] <fifth>
ablative abbr. abl.
• (from - )
• Grammar 1. Of, relating to, or being a grammatical case indicating separation, direction away from, sometimes manner or agency, and the object of certain verbs. It is found in Latin and other Indo-European languages. -- AHTD

6. [chaṭṭhi] <sixth>
genitive abbr. gen. also known as possessive abbr. pos. case
• (of - )
• Grammar adj. 1. Of, relating to, or designating a case that expresses possession, measurement, or source. 2. Of or relating to an affix or a construction, such as a prepositional phrase, characteristic of the genitive case.-- AHTD

7. [sattamī] <seventh>
locative abbr. loc.
• adj. 1. Of, relating to, or being a grammatical case in certain inflected languages that indicates place in or on which or time at which, as in Latin dom º, “ at home. ”  -- AHTD

8.
vocative abbr. voc.
• Grammar adj. 1. Relating to, characteristic of, or used in calling. 2. Abbr. voc. v. Relating to or being a grammatical case used in Latin and certain other languages to indicate the person or thing being addressed. -- AHTD

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Declension of Nouns

Pali nouns are declined according to the terminated endings [a, ā, i, ī, u, ū], and [o]. There are no nouns ending in e. All nouns ending in [a] are either in the masculine or in the neuter gender.

Illustration: [nara] {na.ra.} -- (masc.) <man>

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Nouns ending in [a]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration:
[nara] {na.ra.} -- (masc. sing.) <man>; [narā] {na.ra} -- (masc. plu.)

case		singular			plural
Nominative, nom.	(dir. subject)	naro {na.rau:}	a/the man		narā {na.ra}	men; the men
Accusative, acc.	(dir. object)	naraṃ	a/the man		nare	men; the men
Vocative, voc.		nara narā	O man!		narā	O men!
Instrumental, inst. Cf.: abl.	(by - )	narena	by/with a man		narebhi, narehi	by/with men
Dative, dat. Cf.: gen.	(to - )	narāya narassa	to/for a man		narānam	to/for men
Ablative, abl. Cf.: instr.	(from - )	narā naramhā narasmā	from a man		narebhi, narehi	from men
Genitive, gen.	(of - )	narassa	of a man		narānam	of men
Locative, loc.	(in -, upon -)	nare naramhi narasmim	in/upon a man		naresu	in/upon men

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Pronouns

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration:
[amha] -- < I >
[tumha] -- <you>

[te] , [ṃe] , [vo] , and [no] are not used in the beginning of a sentence.

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Noun ending in [ā]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration: [kaññā] -- (fem. sing.) <maiden, virgin>
                 [kaññā] -- (fem. plu.)

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Noun ending in [i]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration: [muni] -- (masc. sing.) <sage>
                 [munī] -- (masc. plu.)

case		singular			plural
Nominative	(dir. subject)	muni	a/the sage		munī, munayo	sages; the sages
Accusative	(dir. object)	muniṃ	a/the sage		munī, munayo	sage; the sages
Vocative			O sage!			O sages !
Instrumental (compare abl.)	(by - )	muninā	by/with sage		munībhi,  munīhi	by/with sages
Dative (compare gen.)	(to - )	munino, munissa	to/for a sage		munīnaṃ	to/for sages
Ablative (compare instr.)	(from - )	muninā munimhā munismā	from a sage		munībhi munīhi	from sages
Genitive (possessive)	(of - )	munino, munissa	of a sage		munīnaṃ	of sages
Locative	(in -, upon -)	munimhi, minismiṃ	in/upon a sage		munīsu	in/upon sages

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Noun ending in [ ī ]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration: [ sāmī ] -- (masc. sing.) <lord, husband>
                 [ sāmī ] -- (masc. plu.)
UKT: PTS does not list [ sāmī ].
For <husband>, the following Pali words are given:
• [sāmiya] -- PTS p705.
• [ sāmi ] -- http://www.orunla.org/tm/pali/ref/englpali.html#H2
• [ sāmika ] -- http://www.saigon.com/~anson/ebud/dict-ep/dictep-h.htm

case		singular			plural
Nominative compare voc.	(dir. subject)	sāmī	a/the husband		sāmī, sāmino	husbands; the husbands
Accusative	(dir. object)	sāmiṃ	a/the husband		sāmī, sāmino	husbands; the husbands
Vocative		sāmī	O husband!		sāmī, sāmino	O husbands!
Instrumental (compare abl.)	(by - )	sāminā	by/with a husband		sāmībhi, sāmīhi	by/with husbands
Dative (compare gen.)	(to - )	sāmino, sāmissa	to/for a husband		sāmīnaṃ	to/for husbands
Ablative (compare instr.)	(from - )	sāminā, sāmiṃhā, sāmismā	from a husband		sāmībhi, sāmīhi	from husbands
Genitive (possessive)	(of - )	sāmino, sāmissa	of a husband		sāmīnaṃ	of husbands
Locative	(in -, upon -)	sāmini, sāmiṃhi, sāmismiṃ	in/upon a husband		sāmīsu	in/upon husbands
		The loc. sing. has an additional "ni"

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Noun ending in [u]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm
• 2. http://www.geocities.com/derekacameron/pali.html

Illustration: [bhikkhu]  -- (masc. sing.) <monk>
                 [bhikkhu]  -- (masc. plu.)
UKT: Though Ashin Narada in An Elementary Pali Course gave the meaning of this word as <mendicant>, I feel that <mendicant> which can also mean a "begger" is not suitable. [bhikkhu] is a person held in high esteem and is not a despicable beggar.

case		singular			plural
Nominative	(dir. subject)	bhikkhu	a/the monk		bhikkhavo bhikkhū	monks; the monks
Accusative	(dir. object)	bhikkhuṃ	a/the monk		bhikkhavo bhikkū	monks; the monks
Vocative		bhikkhu	O monk !		bhikkhavo bhikkhave bhikkhū	O monks !
Instrumental (compare abl.)	(by - )	bhikkhunā	by/with a monk		bhikkhūbhi bhikkhūhi	by/with monks
Dative (compare gen.)	(to - )	bhikkhussa bhikkhuno	to/for a monk		bhikkhūnaṃ	to/for monks
Ablative (compare instr.)	(from - )	bhikkhusmā bhikkhumhā bhikkhunā	from a monk		bhikkhūbhi bhikkhūhi	from monks
Genitive (possessive)	(of - )	bhikkhussa bhikkhuno	of a monk		bhikkhūnaṃ	of monks
Locative	(in -, upon -)	bhikkhusmiṃ bhikkhumhi	in/upon a monk		bhikkhūsu	in/upon monks

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Noun ending in [ ū ]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration: [abhibhū]   -- (masc. sing.) <conqueror>
                 [abhibhū,] -- (masc. plu.)
UKT: According to 1. An Elementary Pali Course, only nom., voc. and acc. are different from [bhikkhu]. The rest are the same.

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Noun ending in [ o ]

The following illustration is based on the following sources:
• 1. An Elementary Pali Course, by Ven. Narada Thera http://www.vipassana.info/pali%20contents.htm

Illustration: [go] (masc. sing.) <bull>
                 [gāvo] (masc. plu.)

case		singular			plural
Nominative	(dir. subject)	go	a/the bull		gāvo, gavo	bulls; the bulls
Accusative	(dir. object)	gāvuṃ, gavaṃ, gāvaṃ	a/the bull		gāvo, gavo	men; the bulls
Vocative		go	O bull !		gāvo, gavo	O bulls !
Instrumental (compare abl.)	(by - )	gāvena, gavena	by/with a bull		gobhi, gohi	by/with bulls
Dative (compare gen.)	(to - )	gāvassa, gavassa	to/for a bull		gavaṃ, gunnaṃ, gonaṃ	to/for bulls
Ablative (compare instr.)	(from - )	gāvā, gavā, gāvamhā, gavamhā, gāvasmā, gavasmā	from a bull		gobhi, gohi	from bulls
Genitive (possessive)	(of - )	gāvassa, gavassa	of a bull		gavaṃ, gunnaṃ, gonaṃ	of bulls
Locative	(in -, upon -)	gāve, gave, gāvamhi, gavamhi, gāvasmiṃ, gavasmiṃ	in/upon a bull		gosu	in/upon bulls

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UKT notes

case 

UKT note :
• cases (for nouns and pronouns):
   1. subjective (subject) case, aka the subjective , e.g. he
   2. objective (object) case, aka  the objective, e.g. him
   3. possessive (genitive) case, aka the possessive or genitive, e.g. his
• moods or modes (for verbs):
   1. indicative mood, aka the indicative
   2. imperative mood, aka the imperative
   3. subjunctive mood, aka the subjunctive.
The closeness in spelling of subjective and subjunctive is a source of confusion for many students.

From UseE:
Case is used in some languages to show the function of a Noun or Noun Phrase in a sentence by Inflection.
In English nouns have two cases:
     The dog   -- general case
     The dog's  -- genitive case - indicating possession
Personal Pronouns have three cases:
     he   -- subject case
     him   -- object case
     his   -- genitive case
Other languages can have more or fewer cases and many have none.

From GHWW- Univ.Illinois :
Case refers to how nouns and pronouns are used in relation to the other words in a sentence. The three cases are 1. subjective, 2. objective, and 3. possessive.

1. Subjective Case  Subjective case is sometimes called the nominative case. A noun or pronoun is in the subjective when it is used as the subject of the sentence or as a predicate noun. A predicate noun follows a form of the "be " verb, and it renames the subject of the sentence.

I  hope to finish my paper tonight.
Valerie danced in the statewide competition.
He is a clown.

The word clown is a predicate noun. 

2. Objective Case  A noun or pronoun is in the objective case when it is used as a direct object, an indirect object, or an object of the preposition.

Dad prepared the dinner.
Our dog crawled under the fence.
Mom gave us the money.

3. Possessive Case  A noun or pronoun is in the possessive case when it is used to show ownership of an object:

Mom washed Valerie's leotard.
Where did you find her book?

For pronouns:
1. Subjective:  I | you | he | she | it | we | they
2. Objective: me | you | him | her | it | us | them
3. Possessive: my, mine | your, yours | his | her, hers | its | our, ours | their, theirs

From WRUD
case  grammar  : One of the forms, or the inflections or changes of form, of a noun, pronoun, or adjective, which indicate its relation to other words, and in the aggregate constitute its declension; the relation which a noun or pronoun sustains to some other word.
     Case is properly a falling off from the nominative or first state of word; the name for which, however, is now, by extension of its signification, applied also to the nominative. -- J. W. Gibbs.
     Note: Cases other than the nominative are oblique cases. Case endings are terminations by which certain cases are distinguished. In old English, as in Latin, nouns had several cases distinguished by case endings, but in modern English only that of the possessive case is retained.

From Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grammatical_case 080604

In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun indicates its grammatical function in a greater phrase or clause; such as the role of subject, of direct object, or of possessor. While all languages distinguish cases in some fashion, it is only customary to say that a language has cases when these are codified in the morphology of its nouns — that is, when nouns change their form to reflect their case. (Such a change in form is a kind of declension, hence a kind of inflection.) Cases are related to, but distinct from, thematic roles such as agent and patient; while certain cases in each language tend to correspond to certain thematic roles, cases are a syntactic notion whereas thematic roles are a semantic one.

Cases in English
Cases are not very prominent in modern English, except in its personal pronouns (a remnant of the more extensive case system of Old English). For other pronouns, and all nouns, adjectives, and articles, case is indicated only by word order, by prepositions, and by the clitic -'s.

Taken as a whole, English personal pronouns are typically said to have three morphological cases: a subjective case (such as I, he, she, we), used for the subject of a finite verb and sometimes for the complement of a copula; an objective case (such as me, him, her, us), used for the direct or indirect object of a verb, for the object of a preposition, for an absolute disjunct, and sometimes for the complement of a copula; and a possessive case (such as my/mine, his, her(s), our(s)), used for a grammatical possessor. That said, these pronouns often have more than three forms; the possessive case typically has both a determiner form (such as my, our) and a distinct independent form (such as mine, ours). Additionally, except for the interrogative personal pronoun who, they all have a distinct reflexive or intensive form (such as myself, ourselves).

Simplified illustration of some common case categories
While not very prominent in English, cases feature much more saliently in many other Indo-European languages, such as Latin, Greek, German, Slavic. Historically, the Indo-European languages had eight morphological cases, though modern languages typically have fewer, using prepositions and word order to convey information that had previously been conveyed using distinct noun forms. The eight historic cases are as follows, with examples [UKT: I have change the order of presentation to that of Burmese sources]:

• The nominative case, {kat~ta}, which corresponds to English's subjective case, indicates the subject of a finite verb:
   The man went to the store.
Bur-Myan ending: {thæÑ} / {ka:}

• The genitive case, {tha-mi.}, which corresponds to English's possessive case, indicates the possessor of another noun:
  A country's citizens must defend its honour.
Bur-Myan ending: {iÉ}

• The dative case, {than~pa.da-na.}, indicates the indirect object of a verb:
  The man gave his daughter a book.
Bur-Myan ending: {a:} / {Bo.}

• The accusative case, {kam~ma.}, which together with the dative and ablative cases (below) corresponds to English's objective case, indicates the direct object of a verb:
  The man bought a car.
Bur-Myan ending: {ko} / {tho.}

• The instrumental case, {ka.ra.Na.}, indicates an object used in performing an action:
   He shot it with the gun .
Bur-Myan ending: {hpring.} / {nhing.} / {kraung.}

• The ablative case, {a.pa-da-na.}, indicates the object of most common prepositions:
  The boy went with his father to see the doctor.
Bur-Myan ending: {mha.} / {ka.}

• The locative case, {AU:ka-tha.}, indicates a location:
  I live in China.
Bur-Myan ending: {nhÉIk} / {twing} / {wèý} / {pau-mha}

• The vocative case, {a-la.pa.na.}, indicates an addressee:
   John, are you O.K.?
Bur-Myan ending: {o}

UKT: Gray listed the following eight: {kat~ta}; {tha-mi.}; {than~pa.da-na.}; {kam~ma.}; {ka.ra.Na.}; {a.pa-da-na.}; {AU:ka-tha.}; {a-la.pa.na.}

All of the above are just rough descriptions; the precise distinctions vary from language to language, and are often quite complex. Case is arguably based fundamentally on changes to the ending of the noun to indicate the noun's role in the sentence. This is not how English works, where word order and prepositions are used to achieve this; as such it is debatable whether the above examples of English sentences can be said to be examples of 'case' in English.

An example of a Latin case inflection is given below, using the singular forms of the word homo (man), which belongs to Latin's third declension.

• homo (nominative) "[the] man" [as a subject] (e.g. homo ibi stat the man is standing there)
• hominis (genitive) "the man's/of [the] man" (e.g. nomen hominis est Claudius the man's name is Claudius)
• homini (dative) "to/for [the] man" [as an indirect object] (e.g. homini donum dedi I gave a present to the man; homo homini lupus Man is a wolf to man.)
• hominem (accusative) "[the] man" [as a direct object] (e.g.hominem vidi I saw the man)
• homine (ablative) "from/with/in/by [the] man" [in various uses not covered by the above] (e.g. sum altior homine I am taller than the man).

Grammatical case was analyzed extensively in Sanskrit, where it is known as karaka {ka.ra.ka.}. Six varieties are defined by Pāṇini {pa-Ni.ni.}, largely in terms of their semantic roles, but with detailed rules specifying the corresponding morphosyntactic derivations:

• agent (kartri, often in the subject position, performing independently)
• patient (karman, often in object position)
• means (karaṇa, instrument)
• recipient (sampradāna, similar to the dative)
• source (apādāna, similar but not equal to the ablative)
• locus (adhikaraṇa, location or goal)

For example, consider the following sentence in Sanskrit. However since Myanmars are more familiar with Pali-Myanmar, I am trying to get the Pali equivalent. I am waiting for response from my peers 080605.:

{roak~hka. paN~Na Bumi. pa.ta.ti.} -- Pali-Romabama
{thic-ping-mha. a.rwak-thi mré-pau-tho. kya.iÉ.} -- Burmese-Romabama

Here leaf is the agent, tree is the source, and ground is the locus, the corresponding declensions are reflected in the morphemes -am -at and -au respectively.

Languages with rich nominal inflection typically have a number of identifiable declension classes, or groups of nouns that share a similar pattern of case inflection. While Sanskrit has six classes, Latin is traditionally said to have five declension classes. Such languages often exhibit free word order, since thematic roles are not dependent on position.

Though English pronouns can have subject and object forms (he/him, she/her), nouns show only a singular/plural and a possessive/non-possessive distinction (e.g., chair, chairs, chair's, chairs'). Note that chair does not change form between "the chair is here" (subject) and "I saw the chair" (direct object). The n-declension is restricted to a few words like ox-oxen, brother-brethren, and child-children, though in Medieval English the s-declension and the n-declension were in stronger competition.

Case and linguistic topology
Main article: Morphosyntactic alignment

Languages are categorized into several case systems, based on their morphosyntactic alignment — how they group verb agents and patients into cases:

 • Nominative-accusative (or simply accusative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the nominative case, with the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb being in the accusative case.
• Ergative-absolutive (or simply ergative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the absolutive case, with the agent (subject) of a transitive verb being in the ergative case.
• Ergative-accusative (or tripartite): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in its own case (the intransitive case), separate from that of the agent (subject) or patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (which is in the ergative case or accusative case, respectively).
• Active-stative (or simply active): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb can be in one of two cases; if the argument is an agent, as in "He ate," then it is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the agentive case), and if it's a patient, as in "He tripped," then it is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the patientive case).
• Trigger: One noun in a sentence is the topic or focus. This noun is in the trigger case, and information elsewhere in the sentence (for example a verb affix in Tagalog) specifies the role of the trigger. The trigger may be identified as the agent, patient, etc. Other nouns may be inflected for case, but the inflections are overloaded; for example, in Tagalog, the subject and object of a verb are both expressed in the genitive case when they are not in the trigger case.

The following are systems that some languages use to mark case instead of, or in addition to, declension:

• Positional: Nouns are not inflected for case; the position of a noun in the sentence expresses its case.
• Adpositional: Nouns are accompanied by words that mark case.

Some languages have very many cases; for example, Finnish has fifteen (see Finnish language noun cases) and Tsez can even be analyzed as having 126 cases.

The lemma forms of words, which is the form chosen by convention as the canonical form of a word, is usually the most unmarked or basic case, which is typically the nominative, trigger, or absolutive case, whichever a language may have.

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