Learn Russian: Молодому пчеловоду было не с кем поговорить о пчёлах. - The young beekeeper had no one to talk to about bees.

When a preposition (here, с) is used with a predicative negative pronoun like некого (there is nobody to...), the preposition wedges itself right between the particle не and the pronoun. This splits it into three words: не с кем. This happens with all prepositions, for example: не о чем (nothing to talk about) or не к кому (nobody to go to).

Could I use ни с кем here instead of не с кем?

No, they have different grammatical roles. не с кем is used in impersonal sentences with an infinitive to mean there is no one to do something with. ни с кем requires a grammatically negated verb, like in the sentence он ни с кем не говорил (he didn't talk to anyone). Since our sentence means there was no one to talk to and doesn't have a negated verb (like не поговорил), we must use не с кем.

Why is the subject Молодому пчеловоду in the dative case?

Sentences using predicative negative pronouns like не с кем, нечего, or некуда are impersonal. In Russian, the logical subject of an impersonal sentence—the person experiencing this lack of options—must be in the dative case. It translates literally as 'To the young beekeeper, there was no one to talk with.'

Where does the verbal stress fall in the phrase не с кем?