Infinitive

In grammar, the infinitive is the form of a verb that has no inflection to indicate person, number, mood or tense. It is called the "infinitive" because the verb is usually not made "finite", or limited by inflection. In some languages, however, there are inflected forms of the infinitive denoting attributes such as tense, person and number. It happens for example in Portuguese. There are languages that do not have infinitives at all, for example Arabic, Bulgarian and Modern Greek. The infinitive is a verbal noun.

Related Topics:
Grammar - Verb - Inflection - Person - Number - Mood - Tense - Finite - Language - Portuguese - Arabic - Bulgarian - Modern Greek - Verbal noun

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In foreign language courses, the present simple tense of the infinitive is often referred to as the "dictionary form", as this is the basic lemma form of a verb which is usually presented in dictionaries.

Related Topics:
Dictionary - Lemma

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