Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adj. Beginning; initial.
- adj. Grammar Of or being a verb or verbal form that designates the beginning of an action, state, or event, such as the Latin verb tumēscēre, "to begin to swell.”
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- In the state of inception or formation; incipient; rudimentary.
- Expressing or indicating beginning; inceptive: as, an inchoative verb (otherwise called inceptive).
- n. That which begins, or that which expresses the beginning of, an action or state; specifically, in grammar, an inchoative verb.
Wiktionary
- adj. At the beginning, still in an unformed state.
- adj. Aspectually indicating that an action is soon to begin.
- adj. Inflected in or relating to the inchoative aspect.
GNU Webster's 1913
- adj. Expressing or pertaining to a beginning; inceptive.
WordNet 3.0
- n. aspect with regard to the beginning of the action of the verb
- adj. beginning to develop
Examples
“Our train on that first official journey to Washington proved to be a kind of inchoative "Congressional Limited.”
“inchoative" nature.a. Inchoative verbs from the roots of "intransitive verbs" indicate the "beginning" or "coming into existence" of the act or condition expressed in the root: sidigxi, to become sitting, to sit down, to take a seat. starigxi, to become standing, to stand up.”
“Also, forms like *wóidh₂e 'I know' which never ever show reduplication in the later perfect hint at their original meaning and usage: 'I know' (stative) → 'I have come to know' (inchoative) → 'I have known/seen' (perfective past).”
New thought: A 2D matrix of eventive/non-eventive and subjective/objective
“The adjective can serve as the base for deriving two verb lexemes, the inchoative OPEN 'become open' and the causative OPEN 'cause to become open'.”
“A textbook example: English has no causative DIE alongside inchoative DIE because it's pre-empted by causative KILL; in a sense, KILL got there first, so there's no point in creating causative DIE.”
“Thinking less "transitive" and more aspectual, the use of *-mi would be because of its inchoative nature.”
“The graces of the Holy Ghost are either more common and inchoative, or special and completing of the work of conversion.”
The Doctrine of the Saints��� Perseverance Explained and Confirmed
“Trinity present to the soul in a new manner: that is, as the object of direct, though inchoative, knowledge and as the object of experimental love.”
“Only in this way is justice done to the contrasted participle of state (_sedentes_) and inchoative perfect (_castrametati sunt_).”
“Interpreters will tell us of a threefold day, wherein this prophecy or promise is to be fulfilled; that is, the literal or inchoative, evangelical or spiritual, universal or perfect day.”
The Covenants And The Covenanters Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘inchoative’.
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Adjectival Arcana
A roster of adjectives that infrequently surface in typical conversation and writing. Many are dredged from scientific or other technical jargon or sieved from examples of disused archaic forms.
unitegmic, acaulescent, reticuloendothelial, ingressive, uniate, acanthopterygian, ossific, epiphysial, perivisceral, acœlomatous, cestoid, acælomate and 7762 more...
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Lyngwistix
semantic, semiotic, linguistic, etc.
lexeme, sonorant, prosody, monophthong, portmanteau, dithyramb, inflection, deixis, mondegreen, screed, persiflage, polysemy and 27 more...
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