Locative

//ˈlɒk.ə.tɪv// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The locative case.

    "Brian: Ah. Ah, dative, sir! Ahh! No, not dative! Not the dative, sir! No! Ah! Oh, the… accusative! Accusative! Ah! Domum, sir! Ad domum! Ah! Oooh! Ah! Centurion: Except that domus takes the…? Brian: The locative, sir! Centurion: Which is…?!"

  2. 2
    the semantic role of the noun phrase that designates the place of the state or action denoted by the verb wordnet
  3. 3
    A case used to indicate place, or the place where, or wherein. wordnet
Adjective
  1. 1
    Indicating place, or the place where, or wherein. not-comparable

    "a locative adjective"

Synonyms

All synonyms
caselocative caselocative rolelocative rolenominativeprepositional

Example

More examples

"As Paul says, it is really perfectly gratuitous ("es ist im grunde reine willkur") to call the case we have in German (and Old English) a dative, for besides the functions of the dative it fulfils the functions of the old locative, ablative, and instrumental."

Etymology

From Latin locātīvus, from locus. In Indian English, by surface analysis, locate + -ive.

Related phrases

locative absolutelocative adverblocative-qualitative caselocative case

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.