Danish to Croatian: respectful capitals follow different address conventions
A capital letter can identify direct address in Danish
Danish official guidance requires capitals in address forms I, De, Dem, and Deres, while forms such as du and dig remain lowercase. It specifically distinguishes capital De-related address from lowercase third-person reference.
Croatian Orthography describes capitalized Ti-related and Vi-related forms when a writer addresses a particular individual respectfully. The Croatian convention therefore does not simply copy the Danish distribution of capitals. A lowercase Danish du does not independently forbid respectful capitalization in the corresponding Croatian construction.
For an original Danish greeting to one recipient, the target can use a Croatian address convention appropriate to that individual without changing the recipient into another person. Conversely, interpreting every Danish capitalized form as a plural group would lose the possibility of formal direct address to one person.
A group greeting follows a separate Croatian rule
The Croatian guidance specifies lowercase second-person plural forms when addressing a group or when no particular individual is addressed. Its examples include messages to guests and parents as groups.
A Danish message beginning with capitalized plural I can therefore require a lowercase Croatian address form in the corresponding group construction. The case difference is not automatically a reduction in courtesy. It follows the target orthographic distinction between a particular respected individual and collective address.
For an original Danish hotel notice, compare a personal welcome sent to one guest with a general message sent to all guests. Both can be courteous, but the addressee structure differs. The Croatian result should preserve that structure rather than mechanically capitalize every address expression found capitalized in Danish.
This also affects a later possessive expression. A reference to belongings associated with the one recipient and a reference to those associated with the whole group must retain the intended number and relationship. Capitalization helps present the address convention; it is not a substitute for interpreting whose belongings the sentence concerns.
Case changes do not necessarily change the recipient
Croatian Universal Dependencies describes case distinctions across nouns, pronouns, and agreeing words. The Croatian orthography page itself illustrates related address forms such as Vi and Vama, and possessive Vaš. These do not name separate people merely because their endings differ.
Danish likewise distinguishes subject, object, and genitive personal forms. In an original letter, De as a subject, Dem in an object relationship, and Deres inside a noun phrase can all concern the same recipient. The Croatian translation should follow that person across the changing grammatical roles.
For an original Danish request, distinguish asking the recipient to send a document from sending a document to the recipient. The person remains the addressee, but their role in the transfer changes. A target form chosen solely by matching a familiar capital letter could still assign the action incorrectly.
The useful comparison identifies the actual recipient or group first, then the role each address form plays, and finally the target capitalization convention. Danish and Croatian can preserve the same respectful message while using different endings and different patterns of capitals.
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