In linguistics Valency or valence refers to the capacity of a verb to take a specific number and type of arguments (noun phrase positions). A monovalent verb (e.g., "sleep") cannot take a direct object ("He sleeps," versus "He sleeps it."). A trivalent verb has three arguments (e.g., "give" has the giver, the givee, and the thing given).
Another example:
In this sentence:
Newlyn lies at the western end of Mount's Bay.
the verb lies implies the occurrence of a subject and an adverbial (valency = 2).
Compare to the sentence
Newlyn lies
which has a very different meaning
On the other hand in
By the turn of the century Newlyn had changed
the verb changed only requires a subject (valancy = 1) as in the sentence
Newlyn had changed
The linguistical meaning of valence is derived from the definition of valency in chemistry
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Last updated: 05-09-2005 14:30:58
