On Wed, 23 Apr 2008 09:42:28 +0000 in
8wDPj.4238$ko5.888@news-server.bigpond.net.au, John Atkinson wrote:

> "Alec Kojaev"  wrote...
>> James Silverton wrote:
>>>
>>> Just an ignorant question; does Latvian hold the record for number of
>>> cases or are there languages with more?
>>>
>>    Of those that I know of, Finnish has fifteen, Estonian fourteen.
>> There may be much more elaborate systems. A cursory glance at
>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grammatical_cases> makes me
>> shudder.
> 
> Chantyal has 23 cases, which may well be the record.  Interestingly, the
> other Bodic languages (including closely related Nar-Phu and Tamang)
> have only about five or six.  Classical Tibetan has seven.
> 
> John.

    Hah! I see your 23 and raise you 42 (or 64, or even 126 by other
counts): Tsez (Dido) language, Northeast Caucasian family. Huge number of
locatives for various positions and directions, plus eight syntactic
cases.

-- 
Alec Kojaev
St.Petersburg, Russia [30E18 59N56]

Alec Kojaev filted:
>
>On Wed, 23 Apr 2008 09:42:28 +0000 in
>8wDPj.4238$ko5.888@news-server.bigpond.net.au, John Atkinson wrote:
>
>> "Alec Kojaev"  wrote...
>>> James Silverton wrote:
>>>>
>>>> Just an ignorant question; does Latvian hold the record for number of
>>>> cases or are there languages with more?
>>>>
>>>    Of those that I know of, Finnish has fifteen, Estonian fourteen.
>>> There may be much more elaborate systems. A cursory glance at
>>> <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_grammatical_cases> makes me
>>> shudder.
>> 
>> Chantyal has 23 cases, which may well be the record.  Interestingly, the
>> other Bodic languages (including closely related Nar-Phu and Tamang)
>> have only about five or six.  Classical Tibetan has seven.
>> 
>> John.
>
>    Hah! I see your 23 and raise you 42 (or 64, or even 126 by other
>counts): Tsez (Dido) language, Northeast Caucasian family. Huge number of
>locatives for various positions and directions, plus eight syntactic
>cases.

Note to self: never order a pizza delivered in the northeast Caucasus....r


-- 
What good is being an executive if you never get to execute anyone?