Transitive verb

Atransitive verbis averbthat accepts one or moreobjects,for example, 'to enjoy' inDonald enjoysmusic.This contrasts withintransitive verbs,which do not have objects, for example, 'to arise' inDonald arose.

Transitivityis traditionally thought of as a global property of a clause, by which activity is transferred from anagentto apatient.

Transitive verbs can be classified by the number of objects they require. Verbs that accept only twoarguments,asubjectand a singledirect object,are monotransitive. Verbs that accept two objects, a direct object and an indirect object, areditransitive,or less commonlybitransitive.An example of a ditransitive verb in English is the verbto give,which may feature a subject, an indirect object, and a direct object:John gave Mary the book.

Verbs that take three objects aretritransitive.In English a tritransitive verb features an indirect object, a direct object, and aprepositional phrase– as inI'll trade you this bicycle for your binoculars– or else aclausethat behaves like an argument – as inI bet you a pound that he has forgotten.Not alldescriptive grammarsrecognize tritransitive verbs.

Aclausewith a prepositional phrase that expresses a meaning similar to that usually expressed by an object may be calledpseudo-transitive.For example, theIndonesiansentencesDia masuk sekolah( "He attended school" ) andDia masuk ke sekolah( "He went into the school" ) have the same verb (masuk"enter" ), but the first sentence has a direct object while the second has a prepositional phrase in its place.A clause with a direct object plus a prepositional phrase may be calledpseudo-ditransitive,as in theLakhotasentenceHaŋpíkčeka kiŋ lená wé-čage( "I made those moccasins for him" ).Such constructions are sometimes calledcomplex transitive.The category of complex transitives includes not only prepositional phrases but alsodependent clauses,appositives,and other structures.There is some controversy regarding complex transitives and tritransitives; linguists disagree on the nature of the structures.

In contrast to transitive verbs, some verbs take zero objects. Verbs that do not require an object are calledintransitive verbs.An example in modern English is the verbto arrive.

Verbs that can be used in an intransitive or transitive way are calledambitransitive verbs.In English, an example is the verbto eat;the sentencesYou eat(with an intransitive form) andYou eat apples(a transitive form that hasapplesas the object) are both grammatical.

The concept ofvalencyis related totransitivity.The valency of a verb considers all the arguments the verb takes, including both the subject and all of the objects. In contrast to valency, the transitivity of a verb only considers the objects.Subcategorizationis roughlysynonymouswith valency, though they come from different theoretical traditions.

History

Transitive phrases, i.e. phrases containing transitive verbs, were first recognized by thestoicsand from thePeripatetic school,but they probably referred to the whole phrase containing the transitive verb, not just to the verb.The advancements of the stoics were later developed by the philologists of theAlexandrian school.

Lexical vis-à-vis grammatical information

Traditionally, transitivity patterns are thought of aslexicalinformation of the verb, but recent research inconstruction grammarand related theories has argued that transitivity is a grammatical rather than a lexical property, since the same verb very often appears with different transitivity in different contexts.Consider:

• Does your dogbite?(no object)
• The catbithim. (one object)
• Can youbiteme off a piece of banana? (two objects)
• The vasebroke.(no object;anticausativeconstruction)
• Shebrokethe toothpick. (one object)
• Can youbreakme some toothpicks for my model castle? (two objects)
• Stop me before Ibuyagain. (no object;antipassiveconstruction)
• The manboughta ring. (one object)
• The manboughthis wife a ring. (two objects)

In grammatical construction theories, transitivity is considered as an element ofgrammatical construction,rather than an inherent part of verbs.

In English

The following sentences exemplify transitive verbs in English.

• We're going toneeda bigger boat.
• You need tofill inthis form.
• Hang on, I'llhaveit ready in a minute.
• The professortook offhis spectacles.

Other languages

In some languages, morphological features separate verbs based on theirtransitivity,which suggests this is a salientlinguisticfeature. For example, inJapanese:

Thụ nghiệp

Jugyō

が

ga

Thủy まる.

hajimaru.

Thụ nghiệp がThủy まる.

Jugyō gahajimaru.

The class starts.

Tiên sinh

Sensei

が

ga

Thụ nghiệp

jugyō

を

o

Thủy める.

hajimeru.

Tiên sinh が thụ nghiệp をThủy める.

Sensei ga jugyō ohajimeru.

The teacher starts the class.

However, the definition of transitive verbs as those with one object is not universal, and is not used in grammars of many languages.

In Hungarian

Hungarianis sometimes misunderstood to have transitive and intransitive conjugation for all verbs, but there is really only one general conjugation. In present and future, there is a lesser used variant – a definite, or say emphatic conjugation form. It is used only when referring to a previous sentence, or topic, where the object was already mentioned. Logically the definite article a(z) as reference is used here—and due to verb emphasis (definite), word order changes to VO.

• If one does not want to be definite, once can simply say:

házat látok — I see (a) house – (general)

látom a házat — I see the house – (The house we were looking for)

almát eszem — I eat (an) apple – (general)

eszem az almát — I eat the apple – (The one mom told me to)

bort iszom — I drink wine – (general)

iszom a bort — I drink the wine – (That you offered me before)

In English one would say 'I do see the house', etc., stressing the verb – in Hungarian, the object is emphasized – but both mean exactly the same thing.

In Pingelapese

In thePingelapese language,transitive verbs are used in one of four of their most common sentence structures. Transitive verbs according to this language have two main characteristics. These characteristics are action verbs and the sentence must contain a direct object. To elaborate, an action verb is a verb that has a physical action associated to its meaning. The sentence must contain a direct object meaning there must be a recipient of said verb. Two entities must be involved when using a transitive sentence. There is also a fixed word order associated with transitive sentences: subject-transitive verb-object.For example:

Linda (Subject)eaesae (transitive verb) Adino (object) This sentence translates to, Linda knows Adino.

In Polish

The definition of transitive verbs as those with one object is not used in grammars of many languages. For example, it is generally accepted inPolish grammar that transitive verbs are those that:

• Accept adirect object(inaccusativein the positive form, and ingenitivein the negative form)
  OR
• Undergo passive transformation

Both conditions are fulfilled in many instances of transitive verbs:

Maria widzi Jana(Mary sees John;Janais the accusative form ofJan)
Jan jest widziany przez Marię(John is seen by Mary)

See also

• Morphosyntactic alignment