Why some verbs with no prep. take the dative (danken) and others the accusative (belügen)? Some german verbs take the dative (ex. danken, vertrauen, verzeihen, gratulieren, raten, vergeben), as we note in the following setences: Ich danke DIR. Ich vertraue DIR. Ich verzeihe DIR... But some use the accusative (ex. belügen, beraten, verehren): Ich belüge DICH. Ich berate DICH. Ich verehre DICH. I was wondering if there is a rule to distinguish these two kinds of verbs that take only one complement (not like geben, for ex., that takes two complements) and have no preposition that determines the case (ex., für, gegen, aus, bei). Please, please let there be a rule for this (:P) and, if not, let there be some nice table that summarizes this.