The Dative Case (Celownik) in Polish

The Dative case (Celownik) in Polish is primarily used for the indirect object of a sentence (the receiver of the direct object). It answers the questions "komu?" (to whom?) and "czemu?" (to what?). For masculine nouns, the typical ending is "-owi" (e.g., chłopcu, ojcu, but usually -owi). Feminine nouns take endings like "-y" or "-i" or "-e" (similar to locative). Plural endings are uniformly "-om" for all genders (e.g., dzieciom, ocom). It is also triggered by verbs like "dziękować" (to thank) or "pomagać" (to help).