Distributive case

The distributive case (abbreviated DISTR) is used on nouns for the meanings of per or each.

In Hungarian it is -nként and expresses the manner when something happens to each member of a set one by one (e.g., fejenként "per head", esetenként "in some case"), or the frequency in time (hetenként "once a week", tízpercenként "every ten minutes").

In the Finnish language, this adverb type is rare, even rarer in the singular. Its ending is -ttain/-ttäin.^[1] The basic meaning is "separately for each". For example, maa ("country") becomes maittain for an expression like Laki ratifioidaan maittain ("The law is ratified separately in each country"). It can be used to distribute the action to frequent points in time, e.g., päivä (day) has the plural distributive päivittäin (each day).

It can mean also "in (or with) regard to the (cultural) perspective" when combined with a word referring to an inhabitant (-lais-). Frequently Finns (suomalaiset) say that suomalaisittain tuntuu oudolta, että ..., or "in the Finnish perspective, it feels strange that ...".

Grammatical cases

Cases

Morphosyntactic alignment	Absolutive Accusative Direct Ergative Intransitive Nominative Oblique Partitive Pegative

Location, time, direction	Ablative Addirective Adelative Adessive Allative Antessive Apudessive Approximative Delative Distantitive Distributive (–temporal) Egressive Elative Illative Inelative Inessive Initiative Intrative Lative Locative Medial Perlative Pertingent Postdirective Postelative Postessive Prolative Prosecutive Proximative Separative Subdirective Subelative Subessive Sublative Superdirective Superelative Superessive Superlative Temporal Terminative

Possession, companion, instrument	Abessive Associative Caritive Comitative Dative Genitive Instrumental (–comitative) Ornative Possessed Possessive Privative Sociative

State, manner	Adverbial Comparative Equative Essive (–formal, –modal) Exessive Formal Identical Instructive Modal Multiplicative Orientative Revertive Semblative Translative

Cause, purpose	Aversive Benefactive Causal (–final) Evitative Final

Other	Dubitive Postpositional Prepositional Vocative

Declensions

Czech Archaic Dutch English (Middle English, Old English) Finnish German (Old High German) Gothic Irish Latin Latvian Lithuanian Serbo-Croatian Slovak

References

↑ Mäkinen, Panu. "Finnish Grammar - Adverbial Cases". users.jyu.fi. University of Jyväskylä. Retrieved 6 March 2015.

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