begun
- 1Past participle of begin.
The ceremony has begun, so the ushers are closing the doors.
Repairs on the bridge had begun long before the funding was confirmed.
Note
The form that needs a helper: it stands after have in the perfect (the ceremony has begun) and after be in the passive (the bridge was begun in spring). Because begin works with or without an object, the participle can take a noun, a to-infinitive (the regiment they had begun to form), or nothing at all. Used without a helper, it slides into the nonstandard past tense.
- 2Simple past of begin. Obsolete and now nonstandard; the standard past tense is began.
When we've been there ten thousand years, Bright shining as the sun, We've no less days to sing God's praise, Than when we first begun.
1790Note
A past tense that standard English has retired. Modern usage keeps begun for the participle and uses began for the simple past. The older pattern survives in Amazing Grace (1790), where "than when we first begun" rhymes with "sun." Today "he begun" reads as nonstandard speech, so write began in edited prose and save begun for quotation, verse or deliberate dialogue.
begun is a form of begin
begin, verb: To start doing something, or to start happening or existing. Full entry
- Spelling
- begin → begun: irregular (no -ed)
Use it in a sentence
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