Been

How to spell been

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce been

What does been mean?

1. verbThe past participle of 'be', used to form perfect tenses and to indicate having existed, happened, or visited.

Been in a sentence

• I have been here all morning.

• Have you been to the new café?

Where does been come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the past participle of the verb 'to be', and it comes from the Old English verb bēon, meaning 'to exist' or 'to become'. The English verb 'be' is famously irregular because it was stitched together from several different ancient roots: 'am' and 'is' descend from one Indo-European stem, 'was' and 'were' from another meaning 'to dwell or remain', and 'be' and 'been' from the root bheue, meaning 'to grow' or 'to come into being'. That same growing root sits inside the Latin word for 'future' and the English word 'physics' by way of Greek phusis 'nature'. The spelling settled with a double 'e' to match the long vowel, though in much of British and Commonwealth speech 'been' is pronounced to rhyme with 'bean', while many North American speakers say it like 'bin', which is exactly why the spelling can drift in writing.

How the word is built

• been (past participle of the verb 'be', from Old English bēon)

Words that sound like been

They sound the same but mean different things, so the meaning decides which spelling to write.

• bin: A container used for storing things or for holding rubbish and waste.