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/sˈəbstəntɪv/ Listen

adjective

Substantive adj.

Betokening or expressing existence; as, the substantive verb, that is, the verb to be.

Depending on itself; independent. "He considered how sufficient and substantive this land was to maintain itself without any aid of the foreigner."

Enduring; solid; firm; substantial. "Strength and magnitude are qualities which impress the imagination in a powerful and substantive manner."

Pertaining to, or constituting, the essential part or principles; as, the law substantive.

Noun substantive (Gram.), a noun which designates an object, material or immaterial; a substantive.

Substantive color, one which communicates its color without the aid of a mordant or base; opposed to adjective color.

noun

Substantive n. (Gram.) A noun or name; the part of speech which designates something that exists, or some object of thought, either material or immaterial; as, the words man, horse, city, goodness, excellence, are substantives.

verb

Substantive v. t. To substantivize. (R.)

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Etymology of 'Substantive'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Substantive" Quotes from Famous Books

... acting play is entirely supported by the merit of the actor; in which case, it signifies very little whether there be any sense in it or no. Now, your reading play is of a different stamp, and must have wit and meaning in it. These latter I call your substantive, as being able to support themselves. The former are your adjective, as what require the buffoonery and gestures of an actor to be joined with them ...

— Miscellanies, Volume 2 (from Works, Volume 12) • Henry Fielding

... the projects of Louis Napoleon in Mexico, and the consequent sympathies of the United States with Russia against Poland and France, make an imbroglio fatal to Poland. Now that, if the Russian Empire were organized into States possessed of substantive interior nationality (as the French plan is), this would seem to be a very lamentable result. The two Western Cabinets have so acted as to ensure that Russia and the United States shall each desire the aggrandizement ...

— Memoir and Letters of Francis W. Newman • Giberne Sieveking

... his head very little about that; and we still less. We should have been greatly surprised by the novelty and the forbidding look of such words in the grammatical jargon as substantive, indicative and subjunctive. Accuracy of language, whether of speech or writing, must be learnt by practice. And none of us was troubled by scruples in this respect. What was the use of all these subtleties, when, on coming out of school, a lad simply went back ...

— The Life of the Fly - With Which are Interspersed Some Chapters of Autobiography • J. Henri Fabre

... has freshened the blood of conventional style that in the decadence of the End of the Century had grown dilute. This adjuvant strain is found in the enthusiasm of Slang. Slowly its rhetorical power has won foothold in the language. It has won many a verb and substantive, it has conquered idiom and diction, and now it is strong enough to assault the very ...

— The Love Sonnets of a Hoodlum • Wallace Irwin

... dolor; 3, deceit, from the Latin dolus, Gk. [Greek: dolos]. All three have been in wide use and have good authority; but neither 2 (which is presumably that which the writer intends) nor 3 can be restored, nor is it desirable that they should be, the sound having been specially isolated to a substantive and verb in the sense ...

— Society for Pure English, Tract 3 (1920) - A Few Practical Suggestions • Society for Pure English

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