Page:Simplified grammar of the Hungarian language.djvu/24

12 inflected like the nominative, with the exception of the genitive case, which it cannot take twice; as, Házamat eladtam és Péter-é-t megvettem, I sold my house and bought Peter's (that of Peter). Here Péter is in the genitive, and has taken also the accusative suffix -t, which ought to be joined to the object, were it written out; thus, Házamat eladtam és Péternek ház-á-t megvettem (I sold my house and bought Peter's house).

The dative is in form the same as the attributive, but quite different in meaning. In English it is rendered by putting the prepositions "to" or "for" before the substantive. The Dative (from the Latin do, to give) signifies that something is (has or will be) given or imparted to it by a third person, while the attributive claims something as already belonging to it.

This case has often been confounded by grammarians with the attributive, to which it has no other relation than similarity of orthography. The best distinguishing marks are:—(1) That the dative cannot be a subject; (2) that the attributive governs a substantive, and the dative is governed, by a verb.

The accusative (in Hungarian szenvedő, from szenvedni, to suffer) is the noun acted upon by the verb, i.e., "the suffering." Its ending is -t.