In this sentence Der Saal war voll Menschen.
I am wondering:
Of which grammatical case is the Menschen here: the nominative, the genitive or the dative?
Adding an adjective to the noun makes it clearer:
Der Saal war voll grüner Menschen.
So we know it is genitive plural. It is even clearer if we use a noun whose genitive and dative plural forms are distinct:
Der Saal war voll kleiner Kinder.
So it is definitely genitive plural.
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@CarstenS Hmm, stimmt. Ich hab mehr auf das Substantiv geachtet, und dabei gar nicht gemerkt, dass das Adjektiv ja auch wechselt … – Jan May 5 '16 at 20:35
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@Jan : thanks for your answer; I found the following examples: ,,Die Straßen lagen voll Schnee'' (from Duden); ,,Die Straßen lagen voller Schnee'' (from DWDS); would you consider the two as genitive constructions as well, with the genitive affix (Schnee-s) being omitted from explicit marking but UNDERSTOOD instead? – Lynnyo May 6 '16 at 1:31
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@Lynnyo Schnee, being a singulare tantum, works slightly differently, akin to words added onto trotz. I think I would understand voll Schnee to be in dative (but maybe it is nominative, I can’t think of an example where the cases would be different atm), which switches to genitive if an adjective is added: voll gelben Schnees. – Jan May 6 '16 at 10:27
