ergative
Speech parts
1. ergative - Noun
2. ergative - Adjective
Meaning
Example (English)
Compare these two sentences:
A. Jill rolled the ball down the hill.
B. The ball rolled down the hill.
Sentence A is a transitive structure, while sentence B is an ergative structure. The ergative subject of sentence B (“the ball”) has a transitive counterpart in sentence A, where it is the object.
The sentences also show that roll is an ergative verb. It is used intransitively in sentence B to indicate that the ball moved, whereas in sentence A it is used transitively – the same thing happens to the ball, but the sentence identifies Jill as the agent who has caused the ball to move.
ergative (not comparable)
(grammar) With the subject of a transitive construction having grammatical cases or thematic relations different from those of an intransitive construction.
Synonym: elliptical
Antonym: unergative
The case systems of ergative languages are counter-intuitive to speakers of Indo-European languages.
Ellipsis of ergative case (“a grammatical case used to indicate the agent of a transitive verb in ergative-absolutive languages”).
An ergative verb or other expression.
Source: en.wiktionary.orgSynonyms
Examples
In Kalaallisut (Greenlandic) for example, the ergative case is used to mark subjects of transitive verbs and possessors of nouns.
This dizkit can be split like this: * di- is used in the present tense when the verb has a subject (ergative), a direct object (absolutive), and an indirect object, and the object is him/her/it/them.
Many languages show mixed accusative and ergative behaviour (for example: ergative morphology marking the verb arguments, on top of an accusative syntax).
Martin-ek is the agent (transitive subject), so it is marked with the ergative case ending -k (with an epenthetic -e-).
The label is often used for ergative languages which do not have subjects, but have an agent –verb–object order.
Typology Some early Semitic languages are speculated to have had weak ergative features. citation.