Archaic Dutch Declension - Usage of The Dutch Case System - Nominative

Nominative

The nominative (eerste naamval) is the most frequent case in Dutch. The following sentence elements always occur in the nominative:

• The subject: Ik ga naar school (I go to school)
• The attribute: Peter is piloot (Peter is a pilot)
• The direct object (only pronouns demand the accusative case): Anja schildert de muur (Anja paints the wall)
• The indirect object (only pronouns demand the dative case): Joop geeft het meisje een ijsje (Joop gives an ice-cream to the girl)
• All other objects are always in the nominative case: Deze maandag is hij niet naar school gegaan (This Monday he didn't go to school)
• The nominative is required after all prepositions, except for the preposition te, fixed expressions and some prepositions with a figurative meaning (only pronouns demand the accusative case): aan de boom (on the tree), door het huis (through the house)