English

be

/ˈbiː/
Used with past participles of verbs to form the passive voice.

    Etymology graph

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    Origin

    Etymology 1

    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-.

    Etymology 3

    Borrowed from Russian бэ (bɛ).

    From Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.

    Lineage

    • inheritedMiddle Englishbeen “to be”
      • inheritedOld Englishbēon
        • inheritedProto-West Germanic*beun
          • inheritedProto-Germanic*beuną
            • derivedProto-Indo-European*bʰuHyéti
              • partProto-Indo-European*-yéti
    • rootProto-Indo-European*bʰuH- “to become, be”
    • rootProto-Indo-European*h₁es- “to be”
    • rootProto-Indo-European*h₂wes- “to reside”
    • borrowedRussianбэ

    Words built on it: to-be, be-in, been, might-be, maybe

    Sources