

Case markers often distinguish between the various arguments of a predicate, such as the Agent and Patient. Three basic types of arguments are generally distinguished: the subject of a transitive clause, the object of a transitive clause, and the subject of an intransitive clause. <br><br>

A 'yes' value indicates that the language has what is known as a Ergative-Absolutive system on <b>Full NPs</b> (not just pronouns), where the subject of intransitive clauses is formally the same as the object of transitive clauses, but the subject of transitive clauses is different. The unique case for the subject of transitive clauses is known as <b>Ergative</b> case, while the others are known as <b>Absolutive</b>. <br><br>For example, in Hunzib, according to Comrie (2008), the ergative case marker <i>-l</i> only appears on the subject of transitive clauses, as in <i>ozdi<b>-l</b> kid hehe-r</i> 'boy-ERG girl hit-PST'. In contrast to this, the subject of intransitive clauses is the same form as the object of transitives, as in <i>kid y-ut'-ur</i> 'girl CL2-sleep-PST'. Notice that in both example sentences, <i>kid</i> 'girl' has the same form. <br><br>

<b>Note:</b> Languages have no overt case marking will be marked <b>N/A</b> for this property. <br><br>

<b>Reference</b><br>
Comrie, Bernard. 2008. Alignment of Case Marking. In Haspelmath et al. (2008), chapters 98-99. Available online at <a href=â€http://wals.info/feature/98â€>http://wals.info/feature/98</a href>. 
