Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To grow or come to be: became more knowledgeable; will become clearer in the morning.
- v. To be appropriate or suitable to: "It would not become me . . . to interfere with parties” ( Jonathan Swift).
- v. To show to advantage; look good with: The new suit becomes you.
- become of To be the fate of; happen to: What has become of the old garden?
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To come; arrive; betake one's self; go.
- To come about; come into being; pass from non-existence; arise.
- To change or pass from one state of existence to another; come to be something different; come or grow to be: as, the boy rapidly becomes the man.
- To be fit or proper; be decorous or praiseworthy.
- To be the fate of; be the end of; be the final or subsequent condition: after what: as, what will become of our commerce? what will become of us? It applies to place as well as condition: What has become of my friend? that is, where is he? as well as, what is his condition?
- To suit or be suitable to; be congruous with; befit; accord with in character or circumstances; be worthy of or proper to: rarely said of persons.
- To befit in appearance; suit esthetically; grace or adorn.
- [Formerly becomed was sometimes used as the past participle.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To pass from one state to another; to enter into some state or condition, by a change from another state, or by assuming or receiving new properties or qualities, additional matter, or a new character.
- v. obsolete To come; to get.
- v. To suit or be suitable to; to be congruous with; to befit; to accord with, in character or circumstances; to be worthy of, or proper for; to cause to appear well; -- said of persons and things.
WordNet 3.0
- v. enhance the appearance of
- v. undergo a change or development
- v. enter or assume a certain state or condition
- v. come into existence
Etymologies
- From Middle English becomen, bicumen, from Old English becuman ("to come, approach, arrive, enter, meet with, fall in with; happen, befall; befit"), from Proto-Germanic *bikwemanan (“to come around, come about, come across, come by”), equivalent to be- (“about, around”) + come. Cognate with Scots becum ("to come, arrive, reach a destination"), North Frisian bekommen, bykommen ("to come by, obtain, receive"), West Frisian bikomme ("to come by, obtain, receive"), Dutch bekomen ("to come by, obtain, receive"), German bekommen ("to get, receive, obtain"), Swedish bekomma ("to receive, concern"), Gothic (bikwiman, "to come upon one, befall"). Sense of "befit, suit" due to influence from Middle English cweme, icweme, see queem. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English bicomen, from Old English becuman; see gwā- in Indo-European roots. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“I have learned that despite our hardships and our sorrow, we can still become amazing people more than that we can become well saints I guess.”
The Story of Little Sancho - Chapter 4: The man, his salvation and his final lesson.
“The perpetuity of the transformations or the power to become, whenever it pleased, the form it desired; was everywhere recalled to the mind of the people of Ancient Egypt, by the symbolic figure of the scarab, the hieroglyph of the words: _To become_, _to be_, _to be existing_, as also creator, an amulet of power above all others.”
“And this potentiality is thus explained: When a woman conceives, a Soul is immediately sent into the embryo which is to become the infant, in which Soul are then, potentially, all the members and veins of the body, which afterward, from that potency of the Soul, _become_ in the human body of the child to be born.”
Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry
“A spokesperson for said the always-chic Moss will help the label "become an aspirational brand.”
“Has his name become synonymous with a cheat or a curse word-or is he just a human being just like anyone else?”
The Huffington Post: Dr. Dahlia Keen: What is a "Schwarzenegger"?
“It was such a good idea that his name become immortal: all over the country, thousands of lawyers are Shepardizing their cases every day.”
“You mention the term become FREE SEX CHAT NOW the full fledged members.”
“In fact, so common did the term become that I have heard her speaking of the time we salvaged the town of V----.”
“The higher the type of organism the more comprehensive must the term become, not only quantitatively but qualitatively.”
“Has the label become a little overwhelmed with this release also?”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘become’.
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RELI - Genesis
Protagonists and relevant words in the Book of Creation (Source: King James Bible)
Laban, circumcise, beget, Esau, Rebekah, speckle, Sodom, Pharaoh, Canaanite, Canaan, Jacob, Lot and 1286 more...
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EU Buzz - Lisbon Treaty
All words of the Lisbon Treaty
(Persons' names, foreign and grammatical words have been eliminated, MWEs have been split up into individual words. Capitalization has been retained if r...conferral, stateless, person, voting, right, subsidiarity, Latvia, Malta, Slovenia, Lithuania, Finland, Estonia and 2614 more...
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[Open] Stative Verbs
Definition Many of these can also be dynamic.
Please just list bare infinitives to keep the list wieldy. Perhaps a tag (e.g., “stative”) would be sufficient for participles.)act, amaze, appear, appreciate, astonish, become, believe, belong, cost, feel, get, hate and 53 more...
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Belistful
Tubey or not tubey.
belittle, bedazzle, besiege, besmirch, bespeckle, beget, bemoan, befuddle, befriend, become, besot, becloud and 596 more...
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strangelyrouge's Words
glockenspiel, gewgaw, jetsam, flotsam, gripe, grab, wench, whilst, betwixt, hither, thither, yonder and 1034 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
a, abandon, ability, able, abortion, about, above, abroad, absence, absolute, absolutely, absorb and 4334 more...
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aparrish's Words
the, this, and, a, that, i, me, you, him, her, she, he and 96 more...
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be-
around; completely; about; away
beset, besmirch, besmear, bereave, bemoan, befriend, becloud, belabor, become
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b, e, d, g, p and t
decidedly, drench, defeat, delirium, deviant, distance, dimension, dust, dope, dissolve, dissipate, distortion and 63 more...
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Francis Ford Copulae
From wikipedia: ". . . a copula is a word used to link the subject of a sentence with a predicate (a subject complement or an adverbial)." Also known as linking verbs.
act, appear, be, become, get, grow, fall, feel, keep, look, prove, remain and 9 more...
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Words of February
various words discussed in class with students
boundary, foible, flaw, gimmick, tossup, susceptible, skeptical, devise, encircle, whistle, barnstorming, correlative and 18 more...
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OM3 Lesson 17
newscaster, storm, severe, by, may, in fact, snow, viewing area, bridge, overpass, icy, become and 19 more...
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(((^)))
Enchancey.
naturally, easily, unlimited, aware, realizing, experiencing, before, during, after, among, expand, beyond and 31 more...
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Belist
Be- verbs (or verbals).
Words bewet through becalm were gratefully cribbed from Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Be-bewitch, bedeck, bedaub, become, bewilder, beknight, bereave, believe, behead, besiege, bespeak, befriend and 53 more...
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LIT - the 100 most common words of th...
Based on a frequency analysis
ages, already, away, become, bourgeois, bourgeoisie, capital, carried, character, class, commerce, commodity and 88 more...
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to avoid "get"ting
Tweets
Looking for tweets for become.

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