Vocative Form

a special form of nouns that indicates the person or, less frequently, the object being addressed. Examples include the Lithuanian vyre (from vyras, “fine fellow”), the Lak zuzalai (from zuzala, “worker”), and the Bulgarian iunache (from iunak, “fine fellow”). In Russian there are vestiges of the vocative form, such as bozhe (from bog, “god”), druzhe (from drug, “friend”), and otche (from otets, “father”). Special popular forms are used in the vocative, such as “Nad”‘ (for Nadia) and “Serezh” (for Serezha). Some words and phrases that are not actually in the vocative form are used to express a vocative meaning; they are not part of a sentence and are isolated from it syntactically. An example is Proshchai, svobodnaia stikhiia! (“Farewell, free element!”).