factitive

1 definition found

factitive - Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 :

  Factitive \Fac"ti*tive\ a. [See Fact.]
     1. Causing; causative.
        [1913 Webster]
  
     2. (Gram.) Pertaining to that relation which is proper when
        the act, as of a transitive verb, is not merely received
        by an object, but produces some change in the object, as
        when we say, He made the water wine.
        [1913 Webster]
  
              Sometimes the idea of activity in a verb or
              adjective involves in it a reference to an effect,
              in the way of causality, in the active voice on the
              immediate objects, and in the passive voice on the
              subject of such activity. This second object is
              called the factitive object.          --J. W. Gibbs.
        [1913 Webster]