begs

1. 1
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of beg.

   He begs his manager to reconsider the layoffs.

   The stray cat begs at the back door every evening.

   Note

   The -s form serves every sense of the verb: the stray that begs at the door, the employee who begs a manager to reconsider, the situation that begs a violent response. Its most disputed use is in begs the question. Strictly, the phrase says an argument assumes what it claims to prove. Using it to mean "raises the question" is proscribed, so careful writers who mean that simply write raises.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of beg.

   The sultan summoned the regional begs to the capital.

   Several begs ruled the borderlands on the empire's eastern frontier.

   Note

   One spelling hides two quite different plurals. Beside a sultan or a frontier, begs are rulers, because beg is a variant of the title bey, and beys names the same men. Elsewhere, begs are requests, from the noun for an act of begging or an imploring plea. A third beg, short for beginning, forms the same plural, so only context tells a reader which is meant.

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