"Dative" comes from Latin cāsus datīvus ("case for giving"), a translation of Greek δοτικὴ πτῶσις, dotikē ptsis ("inflection for giving"),[1] from its use with the verb didnai "to give".[2] Dionysius Thrax in his Art of Grammar also refers to it as epistaltikḗ "for sending (a letter)",[3] from the verb epistllō "send to", a word from the same root as epistle.