Table of Contents
What is a Verb?
Definition
A verb is a word used to denote an action; explain something about a person or a thing; or tell about the state of something.
The word ‘verb’ comes from the Latin word ‘verbum’ which means ‘word’. The verb is considered to be the most important part of a sentence.
Examples of Verbs
The verb is actually like an indicator which tells us about the state and action of many things.
Denoting an action
- “The girl laughs.”
- “The dog barks.”
Explaining something about a person or a thing
- “The fridge is open.”
- “The clock is working.”
State of something
- “The car is big.”
- “The dog is dead”
- “I feel ashamed.”
Classes of Verbs
Verbs have two main classes which have been created on the basis of their respective function in a sentence. They are:
Main Verbs
Also known as ‘Full Verbs’, these verbs explain the meaning on their own, they do not require more verbs to fully explain what they are implying in a sentence.
For example: “The boy runs fast.”
Here the word ‘runs’ falls under the class of Main Verbs as this single word is sufficient to explain the meaning.
The Main Verbs formulate an open class, because these verbs are huge in number.
Helping Verbs
Also known as ‘Auxiliary Verbs’, these verbs usually cannot exist independently in a sentence. They need main verbs to clarify their meaning.
For example: “She is writing.”
Here the word ‘is’ falls under the class of Helping Verbs and alone is not sufficient to explain the whole meaning. That is why it requires the Main Verb ‘writing’ to explain the whole meaning.
Types of Verbs
Basically there are two kinds of verbs which are classified on the basis of what they denote in a sentence:
Transitive Verbs
The verbs whose action passes over from the Subject to the Object in a sentence are called as the Transitive Verbs.
For example, “The girl kicks the ball”
Here the word ‘kicks’ is the action which is passed over by the ‘girl’ (Subject) to the ‘ball’ (Object).
For example, “John opens the door”
Here the word ‘opens’ is the action which is passed over by ‘John’ (Subject) to the ‘door’ (Object).
Intransitive Verbs
The verbs whose action does not pass over from the Subject to the Object in a sentence are called as the Intransitive Verbs.
For example, “The boy runs”
Here the word ‘runs’ is the action that is not passed over by the subject to any object. Hence, it becomes an Intransitive Verb here.
For example, “Jane sleeps”
Here again, the word ‘sleeps’ denotes action that is not passed over by the subject to an object. Therefore, it shall be classified as an Intransitive Verb.
