noun ergative Relating to or denoting a case of nouns (in some languages, e.g., Basque and Eskimo) that identifies the subject of a transitive verb and is different from the case that identifies the subject of an intransitive verb. 1
noun ergative (linguistics) The ergative case. 0
noun ergative (linguistics) An ergative verb or other expression. 0
adjective ergative (grammar) Used of various situations where the subject of transitive constructions have different grammatical cases or thematic relations to those of intransitive constructions. 0
adjective ergative An ergative verb is a verb that can be both transitive and intransitive, where the subject of the intransitive verb is the same as the object of the transitive verb. For example, 'open' is an ergative verb because you can say 'The door opened' or 'She opened the door'. 0
adjective ergative denoting a type of verb that takes the same noun as either direct object or as subject, with equivalent meaning. Thus, "fuse" is an ergative verb: "He fused the lights" and "The lights fused" have equivalent meaning 0
adjective ergative denoting a case of nouns in certain languages, for example, Inuktitut or Basque, marking a noun used interchangeably as either the direct object of a transitive verb or the subject of an intransitive verb 0
adjective ergative denoting a language that has ergative verbs or ergative nouns 0
noun ergative an ergative verb 0
noun ergative an ergative noun or case of nouns 0
adjective ergative designating, of, or in the case that is taken by the subject of a transitive verb in some languages, as Basque or Georgian, in which the direct object of a transitive verb and the subject of the related intransitive share the same case 0
adjective ergative designating or of a verb or language whose transitive and intransitive uses are related in this way 0
