Transitive
adj, noun ·Moderate ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 A transitive verb.
"This means that subcategorization properties do not allow us to distinguish between transitives and intransitives (both types of verbs are allowed, but not obliged, to take a direct object)."
- 2 a verb (or verb construction) that requires an object in order to be grammatical wordnet
- 1 Making a transit or passage. not-comparable
"For all symbols are fluxional; all language is vehicular and transitive, and is good, as ferries and horses are, for conveyance, not as farms and houses are, for homestead."
- 2 Affected by transference of signification. not-comparable
"By far the greater part of the transitive or derivative applications of words depend on casual and unaccountable caprices of the feelings or the fancy."
- 3 Taking a direct object or objects. not-comparable
"The English verb "to notice" is a transitive verb, because we say things like "She noticed a problem"."
- 4 Having the property that if an element a is related to b and b is related to c, then a is necessarily related to c. not-comparable
""Is an ancestor of" is a transitive relation: if Alice is an ancestor of Bob, and Bob is an ancestor of Carol, then Alice is an ancestor of Carol."
- 5 Such that, for any two elements of the acted-upon set, some group element maps the first to the second. not-comparable
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- 6 Such that, for any two vertices there exists an automorphism which maps one to the other. not-comparable
- 7 Of a set of dice: not having the intransitive property. not-comparable
- 1 designating a verb that requires a direct object to complete the meaning wordnet
Example
More examples"With verbs there are intransitive verbs that don't take an object, and transitive verbs that do take an object."
Etymology
From Latin trānsitīvus, from trānsitus, from trāns (“across”) + itus, from eō (“to go”).
Related phrases
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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.