Dative Case: Basic Rules

The table below represents basic endings of the dative case:

Gender	Singular	Plural
Masculine	-у / -ю	-ам / -ям
Feminine	-е / -и
Neuter	-у /-ю

These endings are added to the stem of nouns, which is formed by dropping the nominative singular endings.

In singular, the ending -ю (for masculine and neuter nouns) is used if the last consonant of the stem is soft (so called soft stem nouns).

In singular, the ending -и is used for feminine nouns ending in -ия or -ь (soft sign).

In plural, the ending -ям (for all three genders) is used if the last consonant of the stem is soft (soft stem nouns). However, some nouns may undergo the spelling rule #2 and they will have the ending -ам (e.g. ночь - ночам).