# All Slavic languages: Vocative case



## Setwale_Charm

I know that Ukrainian has it, and Serbian, I think, has it too. Russian doesn`t. What other Slavic languages make use of it? And is it still widely used?


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

In Slovene it disapeared long time ago. The nominative case is used instead.


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## Jana337

The vocative case is an integral part of the standard Czech language. In colloquial Czech, some people mix the nominative and the vocative if proper names are combined with Mr. etc:
Nominative: Pan Svoboda
(Correct) vocative: Pane Svobodo!
(Colloquial) vocative: Pane Svoboda!

An army officer or a wicked teacher would say Svoboda! as well. 

Jana


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## beclija

In Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian, vocative is well alive for all masculine and feminine nouns, but in plural and on adjectives it is indistinguishable from nominative.


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## Marga H

In Polish vocative exists but a lot of people use nominative instead(in colloquial language)


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## papillon

Russian indeed has lost the vocative case. But I do wonder what are all these "short" nouns that are sometimes used in addressing people:

Мам, закрой дверь.
Вась, дай закурить!
Наташ, ну не шуми...

I wonder if this is the... _new _vocative. (Of course, the phenomenon itself is not new at all. Does anyone know the proper grammatical term for these things?


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## Setwale_Charm

Yes. In Chechen the final "a" of many words is often omitted in pronunciation. With names this feature was long taken by Russians for Vocative forms:

So Седа, Мадина, Милана, Элина are pronounced without the final 'A', just like in papillon`s example. 
  This is a bit of off-top, of course, since Chechen is not a Slavic language, but while Jana is sleeping .


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## Lemminkäinen

I thought Russian had preserved the vocative case in a few expressions such as *боже* (not sure if that's correct)?


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## übermönch

Lemminkäinen said:


> I thought Russian had preserved the vocative case in a few expressions such as *боже* (not sure if that's correct)?


It is correct. Боже appears quite often in prayers, therefore I'd guess it's simply not Russian, but Church Slavonic.


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## Jana337

For the record, "bože" is a Czech word as well.

Jana


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## papillon

übermönch said:


> Боже appears quite often in prayers, therefore I'd guess it's simply not Russian, but Church Slavonic.


I think it's both, Russian just retained the vocative in certain ceremonial expression in words like господи / боже. Note also the archaic/poetic use of vocative in words like 
человече
казаче, though this one is a probably a Ukrainian influence.


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## übermönch

papillon said:


> I think it's both, Russian just retained the vocative in certain ceremonial expression in words like господи / боже. Note also the archaic/poetic use of vocative in words like
> человече
> казаче, though this one is a probably a Ukrainian influence.


Well, at least Человече appears quite often in Church Slavonic prayers (_"Хотя ясти, человече, тело владычне, страхом приступи, да не опалишься, огнь бо есть. Божественную же пия кровь ко общению, первые примирися тя опечалившим; таже дерзая таинственное бражно яждь"_;_"Дом родителей твоих яко чужд имев, водворился еси в            нем нищеобразно: и по преставлении венец прием славы, дивен на земли            явился еси, Алексие, человече Божий, Ангелом и человеком радование."_) and therefore could also be a borrowing.


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## papillon

I agree that the retention of certain vocative nouns in Russian was a liturgical influence. But I wouldn't say that they were borrowed from Church Slavonic... After all, Church Slavonic, in a way, gave rise to Russian. Not precisely, of course, but I'm sure the dialect on which CS was based was pretty close to what various .. pre-Russian tribes were speaking at the time. Therefore, they, at the time, probably had these vocative forms anyway. 

As the language evolved, most vocatives became obsolete, with the exception of боже and such. These forms survived as a result of their continuous use in liturgy.


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## Crescent

I'm afarid this isn't a contribution, but just while we're on the topic, I'm terribly sorry for my ignorance, but what is this ''vocative case''? I'm ashamed to admit, that despite Russian being my native language, I have never ever heard of ''vocative case'' and... I would really like to know what it means, and if it exists in English, French or Spanish. (perhaps then, I could understand it better..) 
Thank you very much for all and any explanations!


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## DrLindenbrock

Crescent said:


> I'm afarid this isn't a contribution, but just while we're on the topic, I'm terribly sorry for my ignorance, but what is this ''vocative case''? I'm ashamed to admit, that despite Russian being my native language, I have never ever heard of ''vocative case'' and... I would really like to know what it means, and if it exists in English, French or Spanish. (perhaps then, I could understand it better..)
> Thank you very much for all and any explanations!


 
Hi,
well, generally speaking the vocative case is (even etymologically, from Latin) the declension a noun (so even a person's name) takes when performing a particular grammatical function: being called upon.

In English and in Romance languages this case no longer exists (but it existed in Latin).
But look at these two sentences in English:
a) John came to us and told us about his problem.
b) John, come here and tell us about your problem!

In (a) John is just the subject of the sentence.
In (b), John is the person being called, summoned, or invited to do something, by another speaker.

In English the word John does not change in form, although it performs two different grammatical functions.
In many Slavic languages there seems to be a difference even in the shape the word takes....maybe you should try translating the two sentences into Russian and seeing what changes occur.

PS in English you notice a noun is used in the vocative case because it is often preceded by words like "hey" and the sentence almost always ends with an exclamation mark. E.g.: Hey, John, wait for us!


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## Crescent

DrLindenbrock said:


> Hi,
> well, generally speaking the vocative case is (even etymologically, from Latin) the declension a noun (so even a person's name) takes when performing a particular grammatical function: being called upon.
> 
> In English and in Romance languages this case no longer exists (but it existed in Latin).
> But look at these two sentences in English:
> a) John came to us and told us about his problem.
> b) John, come here and tell us about your problem!
> 
> In (a) John is just the subject of the sentence.
> In (b), John is the person being called, summoned, or invited to do something, by another speaker.
> 
> In English the word John does not change in form, although it performs two different grammatical functions.
> In many Slavic languages there seems to be a difference even in the shape the word takes....maybe you should try translating the two sentences into Russian and seeing what changes occur.
> 
> PS in English you notice a noun is used in the vocative case because it is often preceded by words like "hey" and the sentence almost always ends with an exclamation mark. E.g.: Hey, John, wait for us!



Oh, thank you enormously for your wonderful and crystally clear explanation!   
I understand very well, now. It's much less complicated than I thought it would be. 
But..as I have understood it, vocative case is simply another way of expressing the  ''imperative mood'', right? (повелительное наклонение) 
I mean, the first sentence that you have given - ''John came to us and told us about his problem'' is simply the indicative mood (изъявительное наклонение). But the second sentence is an _instruction_ for John to come and tell us what his problem is. So that's the imperative! 
Let's see how these sentences differ in Russian:
1. Джон пришел к нам и рассказал нам про свою проблему. 
2. Эй, Джон! Ида- ка ты сюда и расскажи нам, что случилось!

Okay, I understand very well now. But another question is forming in my mind: why then do we say that the vocative case is instinct in Russian?
I use it all the time, me! Like: Саш, помоги мне, пожалуйста, с моим домашним заданием?


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## Lemminkäinen

Crescent said:


> But..as I have understood it, vocative case is simply another way of expressing the  ''imperative mood'', right? (повелительное наклонение)



Not quite. The imperative will often be used with vocative (hypothetically), and in that case the noun that is in vocative will change its form.

Notice how you used *Джон* for both of the sentences - it's in nominative in both cases (no pun intended). That's how you can say the vocative is (practically) exctinct in Russian.


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## Crescent

Aaahh...*understanding dawns upon her*. Right! I think I understand it better now..
So, ..okay, this is how I see it: the imperative mood is for the *verbs. *But, obviously nouns don't have 'moods'. They're not the teenagers verbs are.  
So the nouns have adopted the name ''vocative case''. 
And yes - the name John didn't change at all in both of the sentences! And I do now see what you mean when you say the vocative case is extinct in Russian..
But does that mean it has ever existed? 
It's all crystally clear, maintenant.  Thanks you so much for your explanation!


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## übermönch

Crescent said:


> But does that mean it has ever existed?


Well, since it exists both in Ukrainian and Byelorusian(does it?  cyanista?) the language-that-preceded RU, BR and UA must have had them as well. Unfortunately the people back then wrote in a different language to the one they spoke.


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## papillon

Crescent said:


> And yes - the name John didn't change at all in both of the sentences! And I do now see what you mean when you say the vocative case is extinct in Russian..



Yes, this is exactly why it's a little difficult to explain in Russian the vocative case (звательный падеж)-- we don't really have it, so the names/nouns don't really change when we use them to address someone, i.e. nominative and what would be vocative are the same.

But to see what it would be, just look at Ukrainian.
До мене прийшов кум. Kум - nominative.
Куме, що ти робиш? Куме - vocative.

Also, as we have discussed the only remnants of vocative are in words like Боже.
Бог мне помогает.  Бог - nominative.
Боже, помоги мне. Боже - vocative.


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## Maja

Jana337 said:


> For the record, "Bože" is a Czech word as  well.
> Jana


And Serbian!!!


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## Maja

In Serbian, we have vocative as a standard part of speech. Actually, for a while, I though that we are the only ones that have it... silly me ! 
  But not all nouns are subject to change, e.g. ćerko,  Majo, Jano (), sine, Aleksandre, Miloše, Dragane, Borise... but mama, tata, Ema, Tanja, Nikola (same as  nominative). 
However, some people (in colloquial language) use nominative instead or add vocative endings to nouns that have nominative form in vocative (for instance they would say: mamo instead of mama, but Maja  instead of Majo and Emo instead of Ema).
  Since Jana and Marga said it is the same in their languages, I found this  rather interesting phenomenon!!!


Crescent said:


> But..as I have understood it, vocative case is simply another way of expressing the ''imperative mood'', right? (повелительное наклонение)


No. It is simply the case of address. When you're calling  or addressing smo.


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## Jana337

Maja said:


> Jana337 said:
> 
> 
> 
> For the record, "Bože" is a Czech word as  well.
> Jana
> 
> 
> 
> And Serbian!!!
Click to expand...

I think it was not meant as a correction but still, let me clarify it: In Czech, if you are addressing God in prayers, "Bože" is appropriate. However, it is a popular interjection as well and it needn't be capitalized. 



Jana


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## el_tigre

beclija said:


> In Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian, vocative is well alive for all masculine and feminine nouns, but in plural and on adjectives it is indistinguishable from nominative.


In croatian-kaykavian it *doesn't exist*!

In shtokavian and chakavian does!


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## MindStorm

Пожалуйста, свежайший пример (хихикс), который по идее все русские должны знать. Пушкин, "Сказка о рыбаке и рыбке". "Чего тебе надобно, страче"-самый что ни на есть пример звательного падежа в русском языке. Сейчас в русском языке этого падежа формально нет, однако в принципе он сохраняеться, особенно в разговорных формах слов и имен. Примеры были выше...


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## Setwale_Charm

MindStorm said:


> Пожалуйста, свежайший пример (хихикс), который по идее все русские должны знать. Пушкин, "Сказка о рыбаке и рыбке". "Чего тебе надобно, *страче*"-самый что ни на есть пример звательного падежа в русском языке. Сейчас в русском языке этого падежа формально нет, однако в принципе он сохраняеться, особенно в разговорных формах слов и имен. Примеры были выше...


 
"Старче" to begin with. 

 And I have also found a few examples of further mutations in diminutive in Czech: dum- domek, roh - ruzek, zub- zoubek, kus, kousek, stul - stolek, kvet - kvitek.


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## MindStorm

Yep, you got me =))) Старче, of course.. I've mistyped it....


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## cyanista

übermönch said:


> Well, since it exists both in Ukrainian and Byelorusian(does it?  cyanista?) the language-that-preceded RU, BR and UA must have had them as well. Unfortunately the people back then wrote in a different language to the one they spoke.



Sorry to disappoint you, mönch, but the vocative doesn't exist in modern Belarusian.


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## Anatoli

Russian:

*отче* наш... (in prayers only)


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## Crescent

Anatoli said:


> Russian:
> 
> *отче* наш... (in prayers only)


Простите, в таком случае, каким-же будет именительный падеж слова "отче"?


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## MindStorm

Отец, вимдимо...


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## Crescent

А, ну - в принципе очень может быть! Спасибо!


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Anatoli said:


> Russian:
> 
> *отче* наш... (in prayers only)


We also say "Oče naš,...." in Slovene. Just that "oče" is not vocative but nominative. "Oče naš" is poetic, so it's used in prayers and lyrics, but "naš oče" is from everyday speech.


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## Crescent

Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> We also say "Oče naš,...." in Slovene. Just that "oče" is not vocative but nominative. "Oče naš" is poetic, so it's used in prayers and lyrics, but "naš oče" is from everyday speech.


Oh, that's like ours: Отче наш!  But we never tend to say : _Наш отче _in everyday speech...


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Crescent said:


> Oh, that's like ours: Отче наш!  But we never tend to say : _Наш отче _in everyday speech...


But our "naš oče" simply means "our father". Example:
Naš oče je kupil hišo na podeželju. = Our father has bought a house in the countryside.


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## Jana337

Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> But our "naš oče" simply means "our father". Example:
> Naš oče je kupil hišo na podeželju. = Our father has bought a house in the countryside.


Really?  
Russian: наш отец, the prayer (vocative): Отче наш
Czech: náš otec, the prayer (vocative): Otče náš, jenž jsi na nebesích etc.

The prayer is even called "otčenáš" in Czech and can be declined, like a normal noun.

Jana


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## Irbis

The prayer is in Slovene similarly called "očenaš", also a noun that can be declined.


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## Anatoli

Crescent said:


> Простите, в таком случае, каким-же будет именительный падеж слова "отче"?


отец
Analogous to бог - боже.


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## Maja

The prayer in Serbian is also called "Оченаш" (Očenaš), but also "Молитва Господња" (Molitva Gospodnja).

Otac - vocative "oče".

Оче наш, Који си на небесима... (Oče naš, Koji si na nebesima...)
Church Slavonic: Отче наш, Иже јеси на небесјех...


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Jana337 said:


> Really?


Yeah, I was also surprised a couple of years ago when I heard this. It looks like our forfathers started to use proto-Slavic vocative "otče" for nominative instead of "otec". Who knows why? Maybe because it sounded better.  otče -> oče is just a natural simplification.

I haven't heard of any other vocative->nominative switch, but I must say I haven't really looked for them.

(Well, yes.... Oče naš, ki si v nebesih....)


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## Licorne

And also друг - друже (други plural), князь - княже, человек - человече... it's used as a stylistical variant (and not always to the point )


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## chung

Slovak has lost the vocative for the most part with the nominative as the replacement

In Slovak, you'll see vocative in old texts, or in connection with using certain names or expressions. E.g. Bože! = O God! (from Boh + -e vocative ending)

N.B. Because of the old palatalization that was caused by the -e ending for vocative, the -h becomes -ž. Except for masculine animate nouns in nominative plural, this palatalization is also missing for the most part from modern Slovak compared to some other Slavonic languages.

E.g. Piotr = "Peter" (Polish) | Petr (Czech) | Peter (Slovak)
Piotrze! = O Peter! | Petře! | Peter!

noga = "leg" | noha | noha
o nodzie = "about the leg" | o noze | o nohe (no change for "h" in Slovak)

Słowak = "Slovak man" | Slovák | Slovák
Słowacy = "Slovak men" | Slováci | Slováci (change for "k" in Slovak)


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## ferran

croatian also has vocative, but its use is pretty strange. 
for some female names you have it and for some not.
for ex
Majo! (Maja-nominative)
Ivana! (Ivana - nominative)

male names have vocative, except ones ending with vowel. (correct me if I'm wrong)
Ivan - Ivane (v)
Luka - Luka

it can also depend on a region or dialect.
for ex- i call my grandma: Bako (baka - nominative)
but some say: Baka (as nominative).


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## chernobyl

Well, that's an interesting question. Bulgarian has lost many of its other cases, but the vocative has remained (although not always used).

Proper female names, ending in -a, are not declined, because forms like

Елена -> Елено
Мария -> Марийо

are considered a bit rude.


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## el_tigre

Jana337 said:


> I think it was not meant as a correction but still, let me clarify it: In Czech, if you are addressing God in prayers, "Bože" is appropriate. However, it is a popular interjection as well and it needn't be capitalized.
> Jana



In Croatian we say Bog when we refer to God in Christian/jewish meaning that is specific in monotheistic religions.

If we talk about any other ''god'' we do not capitalize!

Npr. _Zeus je vrhovni grčki bog.
Zeus is supreme Greek god._


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## dec-sev

papillon said:


> I wonder if this is the... _new _vocative. (Of course, the phenomenon itself is not new at all. Does anyone know the proper grammatical term for these things?


 
http://www.zabaznov.ru/rusyaz.html

But I would urge the non-russian not to deepen into the matter in order not to ruin the simplicity of the concept. 


> *Crescent*
> I'm ashamed to admit, that despite Russian being my native language, I have never ever heard of ''vocative case'' and... I would really like to know what it means, and if it exists in English, French or Spanish
> ?


Don’t be ashamed. I wouldn’t have learned about vocative case if not for my friend’s son who is a pupil of the sixth form of an ordinary secondary school in Sevastopol.


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## Maja

el_tigre said:


> In croatian-kaykavian it *doesn't  exist*!
> 
> In shtokavian and chakavian does!


Although a bit off-topic, I hope  Jana wouldn't mind! 

El_tigre, what is the  *standard, official variant* of today's Croatian language?
It  used to be (when it was called Serbo-Croatian) the *štokavian dialect  *(combination of  *Šumadija/Vojvodina ekavian* and  *Eastern Hercegovina* *jekavian*  subdialects).

However, I've  noticed that in your posts, you usually put the three dialects (kajkavian, čakavian and štokavian) in the same plane as if they are three official,  literary versions of Croatian language. Is that the case today?
If not, I  think that can really confuse other foreros, especially those who don't speak  it!
I hope you won't  take this the wrong way, or as a criticism, but people here usually talk about  _standard and grammatically correct languages_ and if they are talking  about dialects or some unconventional / colloquial variant, they emphasize so.  

All the best (and  hopefully with no hard feelings ),
M.


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## mcibor

chung said:


> Slovak has lost the vocative for the most part with the nominative as the replacement
> 
> In Slovak, you'll see vocative in old texts, or in connection with using certain names or expressions. E.g. Bože! = O God! (from Boh + -e vocative ending)
> 
> N.B. Because of the old palatalization that was caused by the -e ending for vocative, the -h becomes -ž. Except for masculine animate nouns in nominative plural, this palatalization is also missing for the most part from modern Slovak compared to some other Slavonic languages.
> 
> E.g. Piotr = "Peter" (Polish) | Petr (Czech) | Peter (Slovak)
> Piotrze! = O Peter! | Petře! | Peter!
> 
> noga = "leg" | noha | noha
> *o nodze* = "about the leg" | o noze | o nohe (no change for "h" in Slovak)


and vocative for noga (leg) in Polish is
nogo



chung said:


> Słowak = "Slovak man" | Slovák | Slovák
> Słowacy = "Slovak men" | Slováci | Slováci (change for "k" in Slovak)


and here it is:
Słowaku for one Slovak man
Słowacy for many Slovak men.

To say the truth all nouns have vocative case in Polish, just sometimes it looks the same as nominative. However it is used less and less nowadays


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## Mac_Linguist

Setwale_Charm said:


> What other Slavic languages make use of it? And is it still widely used?



Macedonian still preserves the vocative case, and the forming of vocative nouns is fairly consistent.  

Feminine nouns (usually ending in an "*а*") change their ending to "*-о*".

Masculine nouns (usually ending in a consonant) change their ending to:
"*-у*" when _monosyllabic_, and to
"*-е*" when _polysyllabic_.
The vocative is used almost only for singular masculine and feminine nouns. I don't know of any neuter nouns that can be used in this way.

Though as mentioned in some other posts, its use can be considered colloquial and even rude. And instead of using vocative forms when calling someone, it's more common to use diminutives ― for example, "_Зоран_" and "_Зоки_".


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