be
/ˈbiː/ verb, noun
Forms am 'm was 's were are 're art 'rt wast wert is beeth bes been weren
- verb (auxiliary) Used with past participles of verbs to form the passive voice. “The dog was saved by the boy.”
- verb Used with present participles of verbs to form the continuous aspect. “The woman is walking.”
- verb Used with to-infinitives of verbs to express intent, obligation, appropriateness, or relative future occurrence. “I am to leave tomorrow.”
- verb Used with past participles of certain intransitive verbs to form the perfect aspect. “He is finished.”
- verb (African-American Vernacular, Caribbean, Ireland, auxiliary, not conjugated) To tend to do, often do; marks the habitual aspect.
- verb (with there, or dialectally it, as dummy subject) To exist. “There is just one woman in town who can help us.”
- verb Used to declare the subject and object identical or equivalent. “Hi, I’m Jim.”
- verb Used to indicate that a predicate nominal applies to the subject. “Rex is a dog.”
- noun The name of the Cyrillic script letter Б / б
Synonyms
get beryllium glucinium atomic number 4 exist equal constitute represent make up comprise follow embody personify live cost
Etymology
From Middle English been (“to be”). See below for more.
Further etymology of be and its conjugated forms
The various forms have three separate origins, which were mixed together at various times in the history of English.
* The forms beginning with b- come from Old English bēon (“to be, become”), from Proto-Germanic *beuną (“to be, exist, come to be, become”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH-yé-ti (“to grow, become, come into being, appear”), from the root *bʰuH-. In particular:
** Now-dialectal use of been as an infinitive of be is either from Middle English been (“to be”) or an extension of the past participle.
** Now-obsolete use of been as a plural present tense (meaning "are") is from Middle English been, be (present plural of been (“to be”), with the -n leveled in from the past and subjunctive; compare competing forms aren/are).
** Use of been as a past participle is from Middle English been, ybeen, from Old English ġebēon.
* The forms beginning with w- come from the aforementioned Old English bēon, which shared its past tense with the verb wesan, from Proto-West Germanic *wesan, from Proto-Germanic *wesaną, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂wes- (“to reside”).
* The remaining forms (am, are, is) are also from Old English wesan (“to be”), Proto-West Germanic *wesan, from Proto-Germanic *wesaną, the present tense of which comes from Proto-Indo-European *h₁és-ti, from the root *h₁es-.
Borrowed from Russian бэ (bɛ).
A variant of by which goes back to Middle English be (variant of Middle English bi).
Webster’s 1913
- verb To exist actually, or in the world of fact; to have ex To be contents his natural desire. Pope.
- verb To exist in a certain manner or relation, --whether as a reality or as a product of thought; to exist as the subject of a certain predicate, that is, as having a certain attribute, or as belonging to a certain sort, or as identical with what is specified, --a word or words for the predicate being annexed; as, to be happy; to be here; to be large, or strong; to be an animal; to be a hero; to be a nonentity; three and two are five; annihilation is the cessation of existence; that is the man.
- A prefix, originally the same word as by; joined with verbs, it serves: (a) To intensify the meaning; as, bespatter, bestir. (b) To render an intransitive verb transitive; as, befall (to fall upon); bespeak (to speak for). (c) To make the action of a verb particular or definite; as, beget (to get as offspring); beset (to set around).
Etymology [OE. been, beon, AS. beón to be, beóm I am; akin to OHG. bim, pim, G. bin, I am, Gael. & Ir. bu was, W. bod to be, Lith. bu-ti, O. Slav. by-ti, to be, L. fu-i I have been, fu-turus about to be, fo-re to be about to be, and perh to fieri to become, Gr. to be born, to be, Skr. bh to be. This verb is defective, and the parts lacking are supplied by verbs from other roots, is, was, which have no radical connection with be. The various forms, am, are, is, was, were, etc., are considered grammatically as parts of the verb "to be", which, with its conjugational forms, is often called the substantive verb. Future, Physic.]
Etymology [AS. be, and in accented form bi, akin to OS. be and bi, OHG. bi, pi, and pi, MHG. be and bi, G. be and bei, Goth. bi, and perh. Gr. about (cf. AS. beseón to look about). By, Amb-.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “be”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details