Begats

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. Archaic word for fathering offspring, used especially in family lists where a man is recorded as the parent of a child ; to bring something into existence or give rise to a result
2. Used of a man who sires a child, particularly in biblical genealogies ; to produce or lead to an outcome, effect, or condition
3. Describes a father producing a child in old family records ; also describes something that generates or results in another thing

Etymology: "Begats" is the plural of "begat", and the system here is a little unusual: "begat" was itself the past tense of "beget", which is a form that has survived almost entirely in one famous setting. The word "begats" appears in lists of descent, as in the long genealogies of the Bible, where one man "begat" another, and the plural form is simply the same verb pressed into service for the many generations of a family tree. Those genealogies are the reason the word is still recognised at all. Outside scripture and the imitations of it, "begat" has all but vanished from ordinary speech, so "begats" now reads as an archaic and slightly playful way of listing descendants rather than a live verb. The plural tells you that the verb, here, is being used as a count of generations, one begetting after another.

Synonyms: sires, fathers, generates