In linguistics, the partitive is a word, phrase, or case that indicates partialness. Nominal partitives are syntactic constructions, such as "some of the children", and may be classified semantically as either set partitives or entity partitives based on the quantifier and the type of embedded noun used. Partitives should not be confused with quantitives (also known as pseudopartitives), which often look similar in form, but behave differently syntactically and have a distinct meaning.
In many Romance and Germanic languages, nominal partitives usually take the form:
[DP Det. + of + [DP Det. + NP]][1]
where the first determiner is a quantifier word, using a prepositional element to link it to the larger set or whole from which that quantity is partitioned. The partitive constructions of the following languages all have the same translation, with a very similar form:
| Language | Nominal partitive |
|---|---|
| English | three of my friends |
| Catalan | tres dels meus amics |
| Spanish | tres de mis amigos |
| French | trois de mes amis |
| Italian | tre dei miei amici |
| Portuguese | três dos meus amigos |
| Dutch | drie van mijn vrienden |
| Greek | τρεις από τους φίλους μου |
Some languages, for example Estonian, Finnish, and Basque have a special partitive case. In Latin, German and Russian, the partitive is expressed by the genitive case, sometimes called the partitive genitive.[2]