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A defective verb is a verb with an incomplete conjugation. Defective verbs cannot be conjugated in certain tenses or moods.
Examples Defective verbs in English In the English language there are few defective verbs. One case is the class of modal auxiliary verbs: "can", "may", "will", "must", and so on. These verbs lack several forms. Most notably, despite all having present indicatives, in Standard English they do not have infinitives ( Another example is the verb be when used with the preposition to to mean 'visit', as in We have been to Paris several times (= 'We have visited Paris several times'). Be is used this way only in the perfect aspect, i.e. as a participle with have. Thus English disallows such forms as Impersonal verbs in English Impersonal verbs such as "rain" and "snow" share some characteristics with the defective verbs in that conjugations such as "I rain" or "they snow" are not often found; however, the crucial distinction is that impersonal verbs are "missing" certain forms for semantic reasons - in other words, the forms themselves exist and the verb is capable of being fully conjugated with all its forms (and is therefore not defective) but some forms are unlikely to be found because they appear meaningless. Nevertheless, it is possible to imagine metaphorical or even literal sentences where the "meaningless" forms can be found, e.g. Contrast the impersonal verb "rain" (where all the forms exist but look semantically odd) with the defective verb "shall" (where only "I shall" is possible): Defective verbs in Latin Latin has defective verbs that possess forms only in the perfect tense system; such verbs have no present tense forms whatsoever. However, these verbs are present in meaning. For example, the first-person form odi and infinitive odisse appear to be the perfect tense of a verb such as meminī meministī meminit meminimus meministis meninērunt Instead of "I remembered", "you remembered", etc., these forms signify "I remember", "you remember", etc. Latin defective verbs also possess regularly formed pluperfect forms (with a simple past tense meaning) and future perfect forms (with a simple future tense meaning). Compare deponent verbs, which are passive in form and active in meaning. | ||||||||
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