begin
Part of speech: verb
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: From Middle English beginnen, from Old English beginnan (“to begin”), from Proto-West Germanic *biginnan, from Proto-Germanic *biginnaną (“to begin”), from be- + base verb *ginnaną also found in Old English onginnan.
Inflected forms:
form: begins
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: beginning
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: began
pos: verb
tags: past
form: begun
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: no-table-tags
pos: verb
tags: table-tags
form: glossary
pos: verb
tags: inflection-template
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: infinitive
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: first-person
present
singular
form: began
pos: verb
tags: first-person
past
singular
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: present
second-person
singular
form: beginnest
pos: verb
tags: archaic
present
second-person
singular
form: began
pos: verb
tags: past
second-person
singular
form: beganst
pos: verb
tags: archaic
past
second-person
singular
form: begannest
pos: verb
tags: archaic
past
second-person
singular
form: begins
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: beginneth
pos: verb
tags: archaic
present
singular
third-person
form: began
pos: verb
tags: past
singular
third-person
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: plural
present
form: began
pos: verb
tags: past
plural
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: present
subjunctive
form: began
pos: verb
tags: past
subjunctive
form: begin
pos: verb
tags: imperative
present
form: -
pos: verb
tags: imperative
past
form: beginning
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: begun
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
Senses:
gloss: To start, to initiate or take the first step into something.
pos: verb
tags: ergative
examples: I began playing the piano at the age of five.
Now that everyone is here, we should begin the presentation.
The program begins at 9 o’clock on the dot.
I rushed to get to class on time, but the lesson had already begun.
The Apoſtle begins our Knowledge in the Creatures, which lead us to the Knowledge of God, if we will make uſe of our Reaſon: [...]
Ye Nymphs of Solyma! begin the ſong: / To heav'nly themes ſublimer ſtrains belong.
Mr. Cooke at once began a tirade against the residents of Asquith for permitting a sandy and generally disgraceful condition of the roads. So roundly did he vituperate the inn management in particular, and with such a loud flow of words, that I trembled lest he should be heard on the veranda.
Of all the queer collections of humans outside of a crazy asylum, it seemed to me this sanitarium was the cup winner. […] When you're well enough off so's you don't have to fret about anything but your heft or your diseases you begin to get queer, I suppose.
As Andrew, in particular, began to work on renovation and improvement, his talk about this began to be peppered with references to 'bodgery' — 'When I look at it, all I see is bodgery, he says recurrently, with a mixture of exclamation and despair.
Similarly, the biotech giant Cargill has begun manufacturing a polymer from vegetable oils that is used in polyurethane foams, which is found in beddings, furniture and car-seat headrests.
State begins fouling and UCLA misses a couple of front-end free throws on one-and-ones.
Since the mid-1980s, when Indonesia first began to clear its bountiful forests on an industrial scale in favour of lucrative palm-oil plantations, “haze” has become an almost annual occurrence in South-East Asia.
gloss: To come into existence.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: Vast chain of being! which from God began.
Synonyms: begin
commence
go
inchoate
initiate
open
issue
get
originate
rock and roll
start
Antonyms: end
Derived words: begin at the wrong end
beginnable
beginner
beginning
begin upon
begin with the chucky
misbegun
rebegin
to begin with
unbegun
Translations: