Editing Latin declension (section)

===Order of cases===
The Roman grammarian [[Aelius Donatus]] (4th century AD), whose work was used as standard throughout the Middle Ages, placed the cases in this order:

:{{lang|la|casus sunt sex: nominativus, genetivus, dativus, accusativus, vocativus, ablativus.}}<ref>[https://archive.org/details/corpusgrammatico01linduoft/page/n28/mode/1up Aelius Donatus, ''Ars Major'', 2.8.]</ref>
:"there are six cases: nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, vocative and ablative."

This order was based on the order used by earlier Greek grammarians, with the addition of the ablative, which does not exist in Greek. The names of the cases also were mostly translated from the Greek terms, such as {{lang|la|[[wikt:accusativus#Latin|accusativus]]}} from the Greek {{lang|grc|[[wikt:αἰτιατικός|αἰτῐᾱτῐκή]]}}.

This traditional order was formerly used in England, such as in ''The School and University Eton Latin Grammar'' (1861).<ref>Mongan, James Roscoe (1861). ''The School and University Eton Latin Grammar, Explanatory and Critical''. London 1861.</ref> That order is still followed in most other European countries. Gildersleeve and Lodge's ''Latin Grammar'' (1895) also follow this order. More recent Latin grammars published in the United States, such as Allen and Greenough's ''New Latin Grammar'' (1903) and ''[[Wheelock's Latin]]'' (first published in 1956) follow this order except they list the vocative last.

However, in Britain and countries influenced by Britain other than the United States, the Latin cases are usually given in the following order: nominative, vocative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative. This order was introduced in [[Benjamin Hall Kennedy]]'s ''Latin Primer'' (1866), with the aim of making tables of declensions easier to recite and memorise (the first three and the last two cases having identical forms in several declensions).{{Full citation needed|date=July 2023}} It is also used in [[France]]<ref>Paul Crouzet (1902), ''Grammaire Latine, simple et complète'', p. 7.</ref> and [[Belgium]]. In [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v6rLLE48RL0 ''Rosa''] (1962), a song in French by the Belgian singer [[Jacques Brel]], Brel sings the declension of "rosa" as {{lang|la|rosa, rosa, rosam}}, following the British order of cases.{{Full citation needed|date=July 2023}}