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Illative (abbreviated ILL; from Latin illatus "brought in") is, in the Finnish language, the Estonian language, the Lithuanian language, and the Hungarian language, the third of the locative cases with the basic meaning of "into (the inside of)". An example from Hungarian is "a házba" (into the house, with "a ház" meaning "the house"). An example from Estonian is "majasse" and "majja" (into the house), formed from "maja" (a house). An example from Finnish is "taloon" (into the house), formed from "talo" (a house). An example from Lithuanian is "laivan" (into the boat) formed from "laivas" (boat).

In FinnishEdit


The other locative cases in Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian are:

In LithuanianEdit

The illative case, denoting direction of movement, is now less common in the standard language but is common in the spoken language, especially in certain dialects. Its singular form, heard more often than the plural, appears in books, newspapers, etc. Most Lithuanian nouns can take the illative ending, indicating that from the descriptive point of view the illative still can be treated as a case in Lithuanian. Since the beginning of the 20th century it isn't included in the lists of standard Lithuanian cases in most grammar books and textbooks, and the prepositional construction į+accusative is more frequently used today to denote direction. The illative case was used extensively in older Lithuanian; the first Lithuanian grammar book, by Daniel Klein, mentions both illative and į+accusative but calls the usage of the illative "more elegant". Later, it has often appeared in the written texts of the authors who grew up in Dzukija or Eastern Aukštaitija, such as Vincas Krėvė-Mickevičius.




  • Feminine gender words (the same cases as above):

External linksEdit