Prolative case

In grammar, the prolative case (abbreviated PROL), also called the vialis case (abbreviated VIA), prosecutive case (abbreviated PROS), traversal case, mediative case, or translative case,[1] is a grammatical case of a noun or pronoun that has the basic meaning of "by way of" or "via".

In Finnish, the prolative case follows an established application in a number of fossilized expressions to indicate "by (medium of transaction)".[2] It can be used in other constructions, but then it does not sound 'natural'.[3] Examples would be "postitse" ("by post"), "puhelimitse" ("by telephone"), "meritse" ("by sea"), "netitse" ("over the Internet"). A number of Finnish grammarians classify the prolative form as an adverb because it does not require agreement with adjectives like other Finnish cases.[4] This claim is not true, however, because an adjective will agree with the prolative: "Hän hoiti asian pitkitse kirjeitse" ("He/she dealt with the matter by way of a long letter").

The prolative exists in a similar state in the Estonian language.

The vialis case in Eskimo–Aleut languages has a similar interpretation, used to express movement using a surface or way. For example, in the Greenlandic language umiarsuakkut 'by ship'[5] or in Central Alaskan Yup'ik kuigkun 'by river' or ikamrakun 'by sled'.

Basque grammars frequently list the nortzat / nortako case (suffix -tzat or -tako) as "prolative" (prolatiboa).[6] However, the meaning of this case is unrelated to the one just described above for other languages and alternatively has been called "essive / translative",[7] as it means "for [something else], as (being) [something else]"; e.g., hiltzat eman "to give up for dead", lelotzat hartu zuten "they took him for a fool".[8] The meaning "by way of" of the case labelled prolative in the above languages is expressed in Basque by means of the instrumental (suffix -[e]z).

This case is also called the prosecutive case in some languages.[1] It is found under this name in Tundra Nenets,[9] in Old Basque and, with spatial nouns, in Mongolian.[10]

See also

Further reading
  • Anhava, Jaakko (2015). "Criteria For Case Forms in Finnish and Hungarian Grammars". journal.fi. Helsinki: Finnish Scholarly Journals Online.

References
  1. Haspelmath, Martin. Terminology of Case in Handbook of Case, Oxford University Press, 2006.
  2. Mäkinen, Panu. "Finnish Grammar - Adverbial Cases". users.jyu.fi. University of Jyväskylä. Retrieved 6 March 2015.
  3. Länsimäki, Maija. "Kirjeitse annettu määräys. Suomen kielen prolatiiveista". Retrieved 13 April 2015.
  4. Korpela, Jukka. "Finnish Cases". www.cs.tut.fi. Retrieved 13 April 2015.
  5. Richard H. Kölbl: Kauderwelsch Band 204, Grönländisch Wort für Wort, ISBN 3-89416-373-9, page 37
  6. Check for example: Ilari Zubiri and Entzi Zubiri's Euskal Gramatika Osoa (Bilbao: Didaktiker, 1995); the declension reference Archived 2007-09-27 at the Wayback Machine at the website of the Basque Autonomous Government's Institute for Euskaldunization and Alphabetization of Adults (HABE); etc.
  7. Jon D. Patrick, Ilari Zubiri: A Student Grammar of Euskara (Munich: Lincom Europa, 2001)
  8. Examples (translated from Spanish) given in Luis Baraiazarra's Diccionario 3000 Hiztegia (available online at euskadi.net), under the entry for Spanish "dar" .
  9. Tapani Salminen (2008-10-06). "Tundra Nenets". Department of Finno-Ugrian Studies, University of Helsinki, Finland. Retrieved 2008-12-30.
  10. Sechenbaatar [Sečenbaγatur], Borjigin. 2003. The Chakhar dialect of Mongol: a morphological description. Helsinki: Finno-Ugrian society. ISBN 952-5150-68-2
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