Dative case in Slovenian

Slovenian ⋙ Slovenian A1

Welcome to our Slovenian grammar course for beginners! Today, we're going to talk about dative.
Before reading the article, we strongly recommend that you read the lesson about nominative for nouns and adjectives and genitive for nouns and adjectives.

Dative

Nouns in the dative case answer the questions komu? (to whom) or čemu? (to what).
The dative case (Dajalnik) is used in combination with the following verbs: telefonirati (to call on the phone), smejati se (to laugh), čuditi se (to be surprised), pomagati (to help), dati (to give), kupiti (to buy), posoditi (to lend), pokazati (to show), povedati (to tell), reči (to say), naročiti (to order), sporočiti (to inform), svetovati (to advise), obljubiti (to promise).

Additionally, it can be used with the following prepositions:
- "k", "h" (before the letters "k" or "g"), proti answering the question kam? (where to).
Examples:

Grem (kam) k zdravniku (I go to the doctor);
Grem (kam) h gospodu Novaku (I go to Mr. Novak);
Peljem (kam) proti morju (I go towards the sea).

- kljub (despite) answering the question čemu? (why, for what?)
Example:

Iti na sprehod kljub (čemu) dežju (To go for a walk despite the rain).

Singular Form

In the singular form, nouns and adjectives have the following endings:

Velikemu psu - To a big dog (masculine);
Dobremu filmu - To a good movie (masculine);
Moji prijateljici - To my friend (feminine);
Zanimivi stvari - To an interesting thing (feminine);
Nedeljskemu kosilu - To a Sunday lunch (neuter);
Športnemu igrišču - To a sports field (neuter).

Masculine and neuter genders show solidarity by having the same endings for both nouns (-u) and adjectives (-emu). However, in the feminine gender, both nouns and adjectives have the ending "-i."

Dual Form

Velikima psoma - To two big dogs (masculine);
Dobrima filmoma - To two good movies (masculine);
Mojima prijateljicama - To two of my friends (feminine);
Zanimivima stvarema - To two interesting things (feminine);
Nedeljskima kosiloma - To two Sunday lunches (neuter);
Športnima igriščema - To two sports fields (neuter).

According to the rules, all adjectives in the dual number have the ending "-ima," regardless of gender. The masculine and neuter genders have the ending "-oma" or "-ema" (after the letters c, č, ž, š, j). In the feminine gender, nouns can have the ending "-ama" or, in exceptional cases, "-ima" or "-ema."

Plural Form

And finally, the plural form:

Velikim psom - To big dogs (masculine);
Dobrim filmom - To good movies (masculine);
Mojim prijateljicam - To my friends (feminine);
Zanimivim stvarem - To interesting things (feminine);
Nedeljskim kosilom - To Sunday lunches (neuter);
Športnim igriščem - To sports fields (neuter).

Please note that the endings of both nouns and adjectives in the plural dative case are different from the dual number, as the final letter "-a" is absent in each gender. Everything else that applies to the dual number also applies to the plural dative case.

Summary

We hope that everything is clear about Dative after reading the article. We are waiting for you in the next lesson, where we will talk about the accusative (Tožilnik). Good luck!