being

Etymology

It is formed from English be + -ing,^[2][3][4][5] and developed from the verbal noun of the verb.^[6][7] The Middle English Dictionary enters it as the gerund being, also beoing and byinge, from bēn.^[8] The verb be is from Old English bēon, from Proto-Germanic *biju- (“I am, I will be”), from Proto-Indo-European *bheue- (“to be, exist, grow”).^[3][9]

Earliest recorded meaning

Existence in relation to a place or condition, also presence, and condition or state: about 1330, in Arthour and Merlin.^[2] The sense of existence as such follows in 1340, in the Ayenbite of Inwyt,^[2][6][8] and Etymonline dates "existence" to about 1300,^[3] Dictionary.com to 1250–1300.^[10]

Semantic evolution

The word began as an abstract noun for existence, and for existence seen as a property, a thing's substance or nature (1340).^[2] Chaucer used it 16 times and Gower 5.^[11] The step to a thing that exists came in the late 14th century:^[3] before 1393 in Gower, in the OED,^[2] and in 1380 in Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, in Barnhart.^[6] From about 1600 it could name God, especially as the Supreme Being,^[2] and since 1666, in Boyle, a living creature, especially a person.^[2] Several practical senses arose and died out: occurrence (about 1400 to 1624), livelihood (1570 to 1731) and standing in the world (1579 to 1819).^[2] Johnson (1755) puts existence first, opposed to nonentity, then a particular state or condition.^[12] The sense of livelihood lasted in dialect, recorded by the English Dialect Dictionary from Fife, Yorkshire, Lancashire, Essex and Sussex, and that of a home, which goes back to Shakespeare's Cymbeline, from Shetland and Orkney, East Anglia, Essex and Sussex.^[13][2] Philosophy kept the abstract sense: Collins records the Aristotelian use for actuality, Merriam-Webster the Hegelian pure being, and the Shorter Oxford being-for-itself and being-in-itself.^[14][7][4]

Timeline

• c. 1330 – existence in a place or condition, presence; condition, state (the latter obsolete by 1609).^[2]
• 1340 – existence; a thing's substance or nature.^[2][8][6]
• before 1393 – something that exists, in Gower.^[2] Barnhart dates a person or thing that exists to 1380, in Chaucer.^[6]
• c. 1400 – occurrence, happening, in Chaucer's Boethius (obsolete by 1624).^[2]
• c. 1460 – adjective, existing, present.^[2]
• 1483 – in being, existing, alive.^[2]
• 1521 – life, physical existence; essential substance.^[2]
• 1528 – conjunction, seeing that, since.^[2][7]
• 1570 – livelihood (obsolete by 1731).^[2]
• 1579 – position, standing in the world (obsolete by 1819).^[2]
• c. 1600 – God, especially Supreme Being.^[2]
• before 1616 – a home, a dwelling.^[2]
• 1666 – a living creature, especially a person.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. The state or fact of existing; existence: The charter brought the new college into being.^[14][7][2]
2. Life, physical existence.^[2][4]
3. One's essential nature or self: He threw his whole being into the work.^[14][2]
4. Something that exists or is thought of as existing, especially a person or other living creature: beings from another planet.^[14][7][2]
5. (with a defining word) God, as in Supreme Being.^[2][4]
6. (philosophy) In Aristotle, actuality; also the most abstract idea of existence, as in Hegel's pure being.^[14][7]
7. (dialect) A home, a dwelling.^[2][13]
8. (obsolete, 1570–1731) Livelihood, living.^[2][4][13]

Adjective

1. Present, existing, as in for the time being.^[7][2]

Conjunction

1. (dialect) Since, seeing that, often with as, as how or that: Being as you're here, you can carry this.^[7][2][13]

Word family

• ill-being
• well-being
• nonbeing
• superbeing
• human being
• supreme being

Related words

• be
• -ing

Usage notes

Merriam-Webster notes that the conjunction being, with being as, being as how and being that, is now dialectal but was once standard, and quotes Shakespeare's 2 Henry IV for it.^[7] The OED likewise calls it regional and nonstandard.^[2]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 29 30 31 32 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
6. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
8. ^ a b c Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
9. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
13. ^ a b c d Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
14. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins