Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • intransitive verb To begin; start. synonym: begin.
  • intransitive verb To enter upon or have a beginning; start.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • To come into existence; take rise or origin; first have existence; begin to be.
  • To enter a new state or assume a new character; begin to be (something different); turn to be or become.
  • To take a degree, or the first degree, in a university or college. See commencement.
  • To cause to begin to be; perform the first act of; enter upon; begin: as, to commence operations; to commence a suit, action, or process in law.
  • Synonyms Commence, Begin. In all ordinary uses commence is exactly synonymous with begin, which, as a purely English word, is nearly always preferable, but more especially before another verb in the infinitive.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To enter upon; to begin; to perform the first act of.
  • intransitive verb To have a beginning or origin; to originate; to start; to begin.
  • intransitive verb Archaic To begin to be, or to act as.
  • intransitive verb engraving To take a degree at a university.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb transitive To begin, start.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb get off the ground
  • verb set in motion, cause to start
  • verb take the first step or steps in carrying out an action

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English commencen, from Old French comencier, from Vulgar Latin *cominitiāre : Latin com-, intensive pref.; see com– + Late Latin initiāre, to begin (from Latin initium, beginning; see ei- in Indo-European roots).]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Old French commencer, from Vulgar Latin cominitiare, formed on Latin com- + initiō

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word commence.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.