supeˈressive, a. (and n.) Gram.
[f. L. superesse to be higher than, survive, remain + -ive.]
Designating a case or grammatical relation which expresses position above or on top of. Also absol. as n.
| 1903 [see introessive a.] 1951 W. K. Matthews Languages U.S.S.R. vi. 99 Marr and M. Brière..recognise secondary cases—a locative, an inessive..a superessive, a disjunctive, [etc.]. 1954 Pei & Gaynor Dict. Linguistics 207 Superessive, in certain languages (notably, languages of the Finno-Ugric family) a declensional case, having the same denotation as the English preposition on or upon. 1971 D. I. Slobin in W. O. Dingwall Survey Linguistic Sci. 310 A variety of Hungarian case endings on nouns indicating such locative relations as illative, elative,..and superessive—that is, in plain English,..the directional notions of into, out of,..and the positional notion of on top of. |