transitive

From Latin trānsitīvus, from trānsitus, from trāns (“across”) + itus, from eō (“to go”).

• enPR: trăn'zĭtĭv, IPA^(key): /ˈtɹænzɪtɪv/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

transitive (not comparable)

1. Making a transit or passage.
   • 1841-1843, Ralph Waldo Emerson, The Poet:

     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.
   • 1843, John Stuart Mill, A System of Logic, Ratiocinative and Inductive:

     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. (grammar, of a verb) Taking a direct object or objects.

   Antonym: intransitive

   The English verb "to notice" is a transitive verb, because we say things like "She noticed a problem".

   • 1908, G. K. Chesterton, Orthodoxy:

     Men have tried to turn "revolutionise" from a transitive to an intransitive verb.

4. (set theory, of a relation on a set) 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.

   Antonyms: intransitive, nontransitive

   "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. (algebra, of a group action) Such that, for any two elements of the acted-upon set, some group element maps the first to the second.
6. (graph theory, of a graph) Such that, for any two vertices there exists an automorphism which maps one to the other.
7. (probability) Of a set of dice: not having the intransitive property.

• reflexive
• symmetric

transitive (plural transitives)

1. (grammar) A transitive verb.
   • 2011, Carmen Dobrovie-Sorin, The Syntax of Romanian: Comparative Studies in Romance, page 136:

     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).

• “transitive”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

• revisitant

• IPA^(key): /tʁɑ̃.zi.tiv/

• Audio

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iv
• Homophone: transitives

transitive

1. feminine singular of transitif

• Audio

  (file)

transitive

1. inflection of transitiv:
   1. strong/mixed nominative/accusative feminine singular
   2. strong nominative/accusative plural
   3. weak nominative all-gender singular
   4. weak accusative feminine/neuter singular

• IPA^(key): /tran.siˈti.ve/, /tran.ziˈti.ve/
• Rhymes: -ive
• Hyphenation: tran‧si‧tì‧ve

transitive f pl

1. feminine plural of transitivo

• intervista, intestarvi, intraviste, rinvestita, rinvitaste, strinatevi, vetrinasti, vetrinista

trānsitīve

1. vocative masculine singular of trānsitīvus