ABSTRACT
ANIMATE AND INANIMATE 239 hand many animates seem never to have had -8, e.g. pater, G. kuon.)
The distinction between animate (or personal) and inanimate (or impersonal) is sometimes shown indirectly in the way in which some case-forms are allowed to survive while others disappear The dative is more often used in words denoting living beings than with inanimates; hence the acc. forms found in the oldest English, moo, )'100, UBie, eowie were early ousted by the dat. me, )'1e, UB, eow (now me, thee, UB, YOu), and somewhat later the old datives hire (her), him, hem (mod. 'em), hwam (whom) displace the old accusatives heo, hine, hie, hwane; them also is a dative. On the other hand, in the neuter it is the old accusatives hit (it), that, what that are preserved at the cost of the datives. Similarly in Dan. the old datives ham, hende, dem, hvem have ousted th9 accusatives (though it is true that in mig, dig the acc. has outlived the dative) ; in North German wem instead of wen, in Fr. lui, It. lui, lei, loro (when not used with a verb) we see the same tendency, while the acc. has carried the day in G. was, Fr. quai, etc.
