Dativobjekten

Dativobjekt, often called the indirect object, is a grammatical object in German that is put in the dative case. It typically marks the recipient, beneficiary, or beneficiary of an action. The Dativobjekt answers questions like Wem? or Wozu? while the direct object, the Akkusativobjekt, answers Wen? or Was?

In a sentence with two objects, the Dativobjekt usually indicates to whom something is given, shown, or made available. For example: Ich schenke dem Kind ein Spielzeug. Here dem Kind is the Dativobjekt and ein Spielzeug is the Akkusativobjekt. Some verbs inherently require a Dativobjekt, such as helfen, danken, gefallen, gehören, folgen, glauben, passen, schmecken, and schaden. Examples: Ich helfe dem Mann. Danke dir. Das Kleid passt mir.

Dativobjekte use the forms of the dative case: personal pronouns are mir, dir, ihm, ihr, uns, euch, ihnen, Ihnen; articles are dem, der, dem, den (plural). In sentences with a verb and two objects, the Dativobjekt commonly precedes the Akkusativobjekt: Ich schenke dem Mann den Ball.

Some verbs allow both a dative and an accusative object with different meanings, e.g., Ich erklärt dem Lehrer den Fehler versus Ich erkläre den Fehler dem Lehrer. The dative can also appear with pronominalization or possessive pronouns: Es gefällt mir; Das gehört dir.

Understanding the Dativobjekt helps clarify sentence roles and word order, especially in ditransitive constructions, and distinguishes indirect objects from direct ones.