"ask":a verb with two objects

Question

I ask you a question.It seems that this sentence can't be rewritten with a preposition (unlike I give you a book ? I give a book to you).In German, the case of "you" is accusative, notdative.But I'm not sure that the case of "you" is dative in every language that has a distinct dative case.So, is the case of "you" in this sentence always accusative?

CalifJim · Accepted Answer

AnonymousSo, is the case of "you" in this sentence always accusative?

The English system of cases contains fewer forms than the German one, and in English only the pronouns have cases. What you call "accusative" and "dative" in German reduce to one form in English called the objective case or object case.

The object case of the personal pronouns in English consist of the pronouns me, you, us, them, him, and her, corresponding to the subject pronouns I, you, we, they, he, and she.

CJ

Cool Breeze · Answer

AnonymousIn German, the case of "you" is accusative, notdative.

You can consider you to be what you call an accusative even in English. No one spoke English in the British Isles before the year 448 AD, when the Angles, Saxons and Jutes began invading Great Britain. The Saxons came from an area that is Hamburg today. The invaders naturally brought their languages with them — and the grammatical structures. Ask can have two objects even in Modern English, which is derived from the languages the invaders spoke in the early days.

CB

Anonymous · Answer

AnonymousIn German, the case of "you" is accusative, notdative.

"Modern https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_language, which almost entirely lacks https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declension in its nouns, does not have an explicitly marked accusative case even in the pronouns. Such forms as whom, them, and her derive rather from the old Germanic https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dative_case forms, of which the -m and -r endings are characteristic. This conflation of the old accusative, dative, instrumental, and (after prepositions) genitive cases is the https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oblique_case. Most modern English grammarians no longer use the Latin accusative/dative model, though they tend to use the terms objective for oblique, subjective for nominative, and possessive for genitive (see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Declension_in_English)." (Wikipedia.)

"ask":a verb with two objects

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