The comparative case is typically a form that words can take, often adverbs and adjectives, which indicate a comparison between one item or person and another. In a sentence like “I am faster than he is,” the word “faster” is an adverb in the comparative form, as it indicates a comparison between the subject and object. This is commonly indicated by the suffix “-er,” though other words can be used to indicate a comparative case such as “more” or “less.” The suffix “-est” and words such as “most” or “least” can be used to indicate the superlative form of a word, which indicates a comparison in which one object has the greatest or least amount of some quality.
Also called the comparative form or degree, the comparative case of an adverb or adjective is typically used to indicate a comparison between two phrases or words in a sentence. This is commonly found as a comparison between the subject and an object in a sentence, though multiple objects can also be compared. In a sentence like “I saw her throw the ball farther than he did,” the word “farther” is in the comparative case. “I” is the subject and “saw” is the predicate for the sentence indicating the action the subject took, while “farther” describes the action taken by the two people who are being compared.
There are a few different ways in which the comparative case for a word can be indicated, though most regular adverbs can be modified with the suffix “-er.” Adverbs like “fast” and “slow” can be made comparative through changes to “faster” and “slower.” This is also true of many regular adjectives, such as the words “tall” and “happy” as comparatives in the forms “taller” and “happier.” These words in comparative case merely indicate that one item has more of a certain quality than another, which can be a positive or negative concept depending on the base word. Words like “more” and “less” can also be used to indicate a comparative such as “He ran more quickly than his dog” or “She is less forgiving than her sister.”
The comparative case is similar to the superlative case in English, which is used to indicate that one item has the most or least of a certain quality when compared to all other things. In the sentence “I am the happiest man in the world,” the word “happiest” is an adjective in the superlative form. It is still a comparison, but rather than comparing one thing to another, it is saying that the subject has the highest possible amount of that quality. “He is the fastest cat” means that the cat is faster than all other cats, while “faster” is more commonly used to compare one cat to another.