>I am not
>certain about German, but I have an inkling that
>"Johann" might be dative even there; it might not be
>clear with a personal name, but I think (correct me if
>I am wrong) that "I asked him a question" would be
>"Ich habe ihm eine Frage gemacht", not "ihn", thus
>dative, while "Frage" would be accusative. Is that
>correct?

I just remembered that I've got a mildewed copy
of Oskar von Hinüber's _Studien zur Kasussyntax
des Pali, besonders des Vinayapi.taka_.

This has a couple of pages on the double
accusative, and there are some cases where an
accusative in Pali is indeed rendered with dative
in von Hinüber's German translation.

Examples:

--So ma.m .dahati gattaani, er brennt mir die Glieder. He burns my limbs.

--verañjo braaha.mo bhagavanta.m etad avoca: Ein
brahmane aus Verañja sagte dies zum Erhabenen. A
brahmin of Veranja said this to the Blessed One.

On the other hand, specifically with a verb
meaning to question, he translates with
accusative in the German as well:

--Sace maya.m aayasmanta.m Revata.m pañha.m
pucchisaama: Wenn wir den ehrwürdigen Revata eine
Frage fragen. If we were to ask the honorable
Revata a question.

This last example looks like a clearcut case of
double acc in von Hinüber's German. Of course,
he's using an awkward kind of German to reflect
the Pali, so I don't know how much value that
example has.

--Itthannaamo sa.mgha.m upasa.mpada.m yaacati:
N.N. bittet den Sa.mgha um Ordination. So and so
requests ordination from the sa.mgha/ So and so
begs the Sa.ngha for ordination.

Above the Pali has a double accusative that
doesn't seem to be renderable as a double acc in
English or German.

best regards,

/Rett