Noun: The Possessive Case ---> Some Exceptions

Hi Friends,

In grammar, the case of a noun or a pronoun is an inflectional form that indicates, its grammatical function in a phrase, clause or a sentence.

For Example,

A pronoun may play the role of subject (I kicked the ball),

of direct object (Rohan kicked me),

or of possessor (This is Ram's cycle.)

Usually, a language is said to "have cases" only if nouns change their form to reflect their case in this way.

For Nouns, we have the following cases:-

Nominative Case:-

When noun is the subject.

Objective\Accusative case:-

When noun is the object.

Eg:-

John kicked the ball.

The noun 'John' is in nominative case.

The noun 'ball' is in objective case.

Possessive Case:-

When the noun is shown to be "possessing\in charge of " something.

Eg:-

This is Ram's Umbrella.

Here the proper Noun 'Ram' is in possessive case and has changed its form by appending apostrophe s.

Formation of Possessive Noun :-

Append with 's. for all cases except when the noun ends with s

Eg:-

The principle visited the Boys' hostel.

Some more, not so peculiar examples:-

1) Karim and Satim's bakery.

2) William and mary's wedding.

3) Raja Rao's and R.k Naraynan's novels.

4) Goldsmith's and Cooper's poems.

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A very important rule:-

The possessive case is used chiefly with names of living things.

1) The Governor's bodyguard.

2) The Lion's mane.

So:-

table's leg--------------------wrong

the leg of the table---------correct

book's cover-----------------wrong

the cover of the book------correct

house's roof----------------wrong.

the roof 0f the house-------correct.

Till next time,

Take Care,

Ashish Mishra