The original locative singular ending, descended from the Old Latin form, remained in use for a few words.
The Latin locative case was only used for the names of cities, "small" islands and a few other isolated words.
The Romans considered all Mediterranean islands to be small except for Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Crete, and Cyprus.
These plural names also use the form similar to the dative and ablative: Athēnīs, at Athens, and Cūmīs, at Cumae.
Some early texts, in particular Homer, retain the locative in some words (for example ἠῶθεν, ēôthen – at dawn, Iliad 24.401).
The locative case had merged with the dative in early Germanic times and was no longer distinct in Proto-Germanic or in any of its descendants.
The dative, however, contrasts with the accusative case, which is used to indicate motion toward a place (it has an allative meaning).
Some uses of independent locatives remain, mostly in expressions of time, such as zimě "in winter", polu nošti "at midnight".
The locative also occurs as the complement of a handful of verbs, such as kŭto prikosnǫ sę rizaxŭ moixŭ?
Statements such as в библиотеке, v biblioteke ("in the library") or на Аляске, na Aljaske ("in Alaska"), demonstrate the use of the prepositional case to indicate location.
Nevertheless, approximately 150 masculine nouns retain a distinct form for the locative case, used only after "в" and "на".
A few feminine nouns that end with the soft sign, such as дверь and пыль, also have a locative form that differs from the prepositional in that the stress shifts to the final syllable: на двери́, na dverí ("on the door"), but при две́ри, pri dvéri ("by the door").
[1][2][3] With some words, such as дом, dom (house), the second locative form is used only in certain idiomatic expressions, while the prepositional is used elsewhere.
[4] For example, "I think about the book" would be written as "Я думаю про книгу, Ya dumayu pro knyhu" in the locative.
The most common locative prepositions are на, na, 'on', and в, у, уві, ув, v, u, uvi, uv, 'in'; usage of these four different variations of "in" depends on whether the next word starts with a consonant or vowel.
[5] The locative is used to indicate static spatial relationships and to talk about thoughts, discussions and nuanced ideas.
[4][6] It is distinguished from dynamic spatial relationships,[6] which indicate action or motion,[4][6] and are expressed in the accusative case in Ukrainian and most other East Slavic languages.
[6] The adlative "goal function", which in most East Slavic grammars is prescribed to be expressed in accusative (for example, Ми поклали книжку на стіл, My poklaly knyzhku na stil, 'We laid a book on the table'), may in Ukrainian sometimes be expressed in locative instead (Ми поклали книжку на столі, My poklaly knyzhku na stoli, 'We laid a book on the table'; the difference in meaning cannot be translated into English), but it is only considered acceptable under certain circumstances.
However, during the Russification of Soviet Ukraine between the 1930s and the 1980s, several expressions in the Ukrainian language using the locative case, such as "на адресу, na adresu, 'at the address'", were changed by Soviet linguistic policies, in this instance to a genitive case to "за адресою, za adresoyu", in order to conform to standard Russian "за адресом, za adresom".
[8] On the other hand, post-Soviet users of Surzhyk may mistakenly be employing the locative Russian form, instead of the instrumental Ukrainian form, in a sentence like "The book is written in English":[9] In the Eastern standard of the Armenian language non-animate nouns take -ում (-um) for the locative.
There are four simple locative case endings: Furthermore, Kazakh nouns frequently utilize a possessive affix to indicate a relationship between the object and its owner.
Proto-Uralic has been reconstructed with a single "state" or "stationary" locative case, with the ending *-na or *-nä in accordance with vowel harmony.