Possessive articles in the dative (meinem, meiner, meinem, meinen)

Ich fahre mit meinem Bruder und seiner Freundin.I'm travelling with my brother and his girlfriend.

Possessive articles (mein, dein, sein…) take the same endings as ein. In the dative that means -em (masc./neut.), -er (fem.), -en (plural) — exactly the dative ein-word endings from einem, einer, keinem. (The genitive comes later, at B1.)

Quick shortcut: in the dative, every gender takes an ending — -em for masculine and neuter, -er for feminine, -en for plural — exactly the endings on einem/einer/einen.

The full paradigm

Here's mein- declined through all three cases you've learned so far:

• Ich helfe meinem Vater. (I'm helping my father.) — masculine, dative
• Ich schreibe meiner Mutter. (I'm writing to my mother.) — feminine, dative
• Ich gebe meinem Kind das Buch. (I'm giving my child the book.) — neuter, dative
• Ich helfe meinen Kindern. (I'm helping my children.) — plural, dative — remember the noun's own -n too (unless the plural already ends in -n or -s, like Frauen or Autos), exactly as with any other dative plural

Every other possessive stem — dein-, sein-, ihr-, unser-, euer-, ihr-/Ihr- — takes these same dative endings. Only the stem changes with the owner; the endings only ever depend on the noun's gender, number, and case.

Why the endings look familiar

Line up the dative endings on mein- next to the ones on ein and dem, and nothing here is new:

Mein-, like ein, is an ein-word — an article that takes ein's set of endings rather than being declined like der/die/das itself. Its dative ending just happens to match the tail end of the definite article's own dative form: -em where dem ends in -em, -er where der ends in -er, -en where den ends in -en. Possessive articles simply extend the same pattern into the plural, where ein itself has no form at all.

Euer still drops its e

The spelling twist from the nominative/accusative lesson carries over unchanged: euer drops the e right before the r whenever an ending follows, including in the dative:

• ✅ Ich helfe eurem Vater. — not ❌ euerem
• ✅ Ich schreibe eurer Mutter. — not ❌ euerer

Common mistakes

• ❌ Ich helfe mein Vater. → ✅ Ich helfe meinem Vater. (dative always adds an ending, even for masculine and neuter, which had no ending at all in the nominative)
• ❌ Ich gebe meinem Kinder das Buch. → ✅ Ich gebe meinen Kindern das Buch. (plural dative is -en on the article — meinem is the masculine/neuter form, not the plural one)
• ❌ Ich schreibe meine Mutter. → ✅ Ich schreibe meiner Mutter. (feminine looks the same in the nominative and accusative, but the dative -er is different from both)
• ❌ Ich helfe euerem Bruder. → ✅ Ich helfe eurem Bruder. (euer drops its middle e here too, just like in the nominative and accusative)

Quick check

Fill in the correct dative possessive form.

1. (ich) Ich helfe ____ Schwester. (mein / meiner / meine)
2. (er) Ich schreibe ____ Vater einen Brief. (sein / seinem / seiner)
3. (wir) Ich gebe ____ Kindern die Bücher. (unser / unseren / unserem)
4. (ihr) Ich danke ____ Lehrer. (euer / eurem / eure)

Key takeaways

• Possessive articles take the same dative endings as any other ein-word: -em for masculine and neuter, -er for feminine, -en for plural.
• These endings match the definite article's own dative forms — dem, der, dem, den — just added onto the possessive stem instead.
• Unlike the nominative, where masculine and neuter have no ending at all, the dative always adds one, for every gender.
• Don't forget the plural noun's own -n alongside the article ending, as with any other dative plural — unless the plural already ends in -n or -s.
• Euer still drops its middle -e before a dative ending: eurem, eurer — not euerem/euerer.