Du verbe actif au verbe transitif

The question we propose to examine in this contribution is the following: How did the “active verb” category in French grammar, which was inherited from Latin grammar, be­come the “transitive verb” category? The definition of the active verb is based in fact on the superposition of two characteristics: the semantics of the action and the direct construction. The history of the emergence of the category of the transitive verb results from a process of separation of these criteria realized over the long term in line with the emergence of the notion of the complement.