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Inlinguistics,abessive (abbreviatedABE orABESS),caritive (abbreviatedCAR)[1] andprivative (abbreviatedPRIV) is thegrammatical case expressing the lack or absence of the marked noun. InEnglish, the corresponding function is expressed by theprepositionwithout or by thesuffix-less.
The nameabessive is derived fromabesse "to be away/absent", and is especially used in reference toUralic languages. The namecaritive is derived from Latin:carere "to lack", and is especially used in reference toCaucasian languages. The nameprivative is derived from Latin:privare "to deprive".
In theSomali language, the abessive case is marked by-la'. For example:
InMartuthunira, the privative case is formed with either-wirriwa or-wirraa.[2]
In theFinnish language, the abessive case is marked by-tta for back vowels and-ttä for front vowels according tovowel harmony. For example:
An equivalent construction exists using the wordilman and thepartitive:
or, less commonly:
The abessive case ofnouns is rarely used in writing and even less in speech, although some abessive forms are more common than their equivalentilman forms:
The abessive is, however, commonly used innominal forms of verbs (formed with the affix-ma- /-mä-):
This form can often be replaced by using the negative form of the verb:
It is possible to occasionally hear what is considered wrong usage of the abessive in Finnish, where the abessive andilman forms are combined:
There is debate as to whether this is interference fromEstonian.
Estonian also uses the abessive, which is marked by-ta in both the singular and the plural:
Unlike in Finnish, the abessive is commonly used in both written and spoken Estonian.
Thenominal forms of verbs are marked with the affix-ma- and the abessive marker-ta:
Tallinn has a pair ofbars that play on the use of thecomitative andabessive, theNimeta baar[3] (the nameless bar) and theNimega baar[4] (the bar with a name).
Theabessive marker for nouns inSkolt Sámi is-tää or-taa in both the singular and the plural:
Theabessive-like non-finite verb form (converb) is-ǩâni or-kani:
Unlike Finnish, the Skolt Sámi abessive has no competing expression for lack of an item.
Theabessive marker for nouns inInari Sámi is-táá. The corresponding non-finite verb form is-hánnáá,-hinnáá or-hennáá.
The abessive is not used productively in the Western Sámi languages, although it may occur as acranberry morpheme.
InHungarian, the abessive case is marked by-talan for back vowels and-telen for front vowels according tovowel harmony. Sometimes, with certain roots, the suffix becomes-tlan or-tlen. For example:
There is also the postpositionnélkül, which also means without, but is not meant for physical locations.[5]
InMongolian, the privative suffix is-гүй (-güy). It is not universally considered to be a case, because the suffix does not conform tovowel harmony or undergo any stem-dependent orthographical variation. However, its grammatical function is the precise inverse of thecomitative case, and the two form a pair of complementary case forms.[6]