stative

See also: Stative

English

Etymology

Latin stativus

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈsteɪtɪv/
• Rhymes: -eɪtɪv

Adjective

stative (not comparable)

1. (grammar) Of a verb: asserting, generally intransitively, that a subject has a particular property or status.
   • 1903 Frank R. Blake: So-Called Intransitive Verbal Forms in the Semitic Languages. Dissertation Submitted to the Johns Hopkins University. Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. xxiv, pp.145-204

     Granted, then, that the original meaning of these verbs was stative, the fact that a number of them have more or less involuntary meaning admits of a ready explanation. From the idea of becoming, in which originally there was in all probability no idea of volition, the idea of becoming, happening independently of the will, might very readily be developed, and this may have taken place in the case of verbs with more or less involuntary meaning. After this involuntary type was once established, it is of course possible that it should have become independently productive, and that verbs expressing an involuntary action not derived from more original stative verbs should take the intransitive form. Such a process, however, does not seem to have taken place in Hebrew. The so-called intransitive verbs, therefore, to judge from the material in Hebrew, seem originally to have denoted states or conditions or a change of state, while the transitive verbs denoted actions.

   • 2000James P. Allen: Middle Egyptian: An Introduction to the Language and Culture of Hieroglyphs. Cambridge University Press

     The stative is a verb form used to express a state of being in which its subject is, was, or will be. Originally, the stative expressed the perfect tense: that is, completed action. By Middle Egyptian, however, other verb forms were used for that function, and the stative had come to express instead the result of a completed action. In this respect, the stative is similar to the English past participle. In the sentence The table is set, for example, the past participle set describes both a state in which its subject (the table) is and the result of a prior action (in this case, of someone setting the table). Because of this similarity, the stative is sometimes called the pseudoparticiple. The stative still retains its older meaning of completed action in one use in Middle Egyptian, and for this reason it is also known as the old perfective.

2. (military, obsolete, rare) Of or relating to a fixed camp, or military posts or quarters.
   • 1805 On the Situation, Manners and Inhabitants of Germany; and the Life Of Agricola; by Cornelius Tacitus: Translated into English by John Aikin.

     The camp also was weak, being no more than a common one, such as the Romans flung up on their march. It has no appearance of ever having been stative.

   • 1831 James Knox: The topography of the basin of the Tay

     It is evident, that a Roman station has existed at Bertha; and one of the objects of its construction here, seems to have been the command of the ford across the Tay. Derder's Ford, being the first above the tide-way, the importance of the position, in a military point of view, is obvious. From the ramparts that remain, it appears to have been of considerably larger dimensions than the celebrated stative camp at Ardoch.

Synonyms

• descriptive

Antonyms

• dynamic

Derived terms

• stative verb

Noun

stative (plural statives)

1. (grammar) A construct asserting that a subject has a particular property.

References

• “stative”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• stative on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Latin

Adjective

statīve

1. vocative masculine singular of statīvus