NativLang | Romance Languages: noun cases & articles @NativLang | Uploaded January 2013 | Updated October 2024, 1 week ago.
The next in a series of short lessons introducing the basic grammar of the Romance languages. This video gives a quick overview of noun cases and articles in Vulgar Latin and the Romance languages. Learn about the remnants of the Latin nominative and accusative cases in the modern languages. See how Vulgar Latin developed definite and indefinite articles.

The use of Latin noun cases faded over time. Basic noun forms come from the accusative case. The old nominative endings survive in Italian and Romanian plural nouns. Romanian also retains genitive/dative noun endings: 'lupul' "the wolf" versus 'lupului' "to the wolf".

The definite article comes from *illu (Sardinian & Balearic Catalan *issu). Romance languages rely on *unu (the number "one") for the indefinite article.

"The Grammar of Romance" has an associated website (free) and book ($). Both offer more explanations and examples:
nativlang.com/romance-languages
amazon.com/gp/product/1475246633/ref=as_li_ss_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=nativlangu-20

CORRECTIONS & ADDITIONS
- the "zero article" also marks a vocative in the modern languages, apart from Eastern Romance (thanks, ankhi3)

Music by Kevin MacLeod