Verb Meaning
/vɜːb/Definition, CEFR level A2, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
Listen pronunciation
Definition
nounA word that indicates an action, event, or state of being.
nounAny word; a vocable.
Sentence Examples
In English, the usual sentence structure is Subject - Verb - Object/Complement.
In English the verb precedes the object.
A sentence normally has a subject and a verb.
CEFR Practice Quiz
In the sentence 'The dog runs,' the word 'runs' functions as a ____.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
In a sentence, the ____ is the word that describes an action or a state of being of the many subjects today.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English verbe, directly from Latin verbum (“word, verb”), reinforced by Old French verbe, from Proto-Indo-European *werdʰo-. Doublet of verve and word.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"In ſo moche that if any verbe be of the thyꝛde coniugation / I ſet out all his rotes and tenſes[…]"
— 1530 July 18, Iohan Palſgrave, “The Introduction”, in Leſclarciſſement de la langue francoyſe […] , London: Richard Pynſon, Iohan Haukyns, →OCLC, page 32; reprinted as Lesclarcissement de la langue françoyse, Genève: Slatkine Reprints, 1972:
"a Verb of the Singular"
— 1692–1717, Robert South, Twelve Sermons Preached upon Several Occasions, volume (please specify |volume=I to VI), London:
"You can invoke the Properties OLE verb in many ways. The easiest way is to move the mouse over the border of the control until it becomes only a four-way pointer and then right-click."
— 1995, Adam Denning, OLE Controls Inside Out, page 321:
"The InfiniBand verbs, which are closely modeled in the “Gen2” interface, provide the functional specification for the operations that should be allowed on an InfiniBand compliant adapter."
— 2016, Ada Gavrilovska, Attaining High Performance Communications: A Vertical Approach:
"I like to verb words.... I take nouns and adjectives and use them as verbs. Remember when "access" was a thing? Now it's something you DO. It got verbed. Verbing weirds language."
— 1993 January 25, Bill Watterson, Calvin and Hobbes:
Explore More A2 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
In the sentence 'The dog runs,' the word 'runs' functions as a ____.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
In a sentence, the ____ is the word that describes an action or a state of being of the many subjects today.