In
linguistics,
declension is the
inflection of
nouns,
pronouns,
adjectives, and
articles to indicate
number (at least singular and plural),
case (
nominative or subjective,
genitive or possessive, etc.), and
gender. A declension is also a group of nouns that follow a particular pattern of inflection.
Declension occurs in many of the world's languages, and features very prominently in many
European languages.
Old English was a highly inflected language, as befits its
Indo-European and especially its
Germanic linguistic ancestry, but its declensions greatly simplified as it evolved into
Modern English.