different between befall vs occur

English

Etymology

From Middle English bifallen, from Old English befeallan, from Proto-Germanic *bifallan?; equivalent to be- +? fall.

Pronunciation

• (UK): IPA^(key): /b??f??l/
• (US): IPA^(key): /b??f?l/, IPA^(key): /b??f?l/
• Rhymes: -??l

Verb

befall (third-person singular simple present befalls, present participle befalling, simple past befell, past participle befallen)

1. (transitive) To fall upon; fall all over; overtake

   At dusk an unusual calm befalls the wetlands.

2. (intransitive) To happen.
3. (transitive) To happen to.

   Temptation befell me.

   • 1886-88, Richard F. Burton, The Supplemental Nights to the Thousand Nights and a Night:

     But as soon as her son espied her, bowl in hand, he thought that haply something untoward had befallen her, but he would not ask of aught until such time as she had set down the bowl, when she acquainted him with that which had occurred […]
4. (intransitive, obsolete) To fall.
   • c. 1620, anonymous, “Tom o’ Bedlam’s Song” in Giles Earle his Booke (British Museum, Additional MSS. 24, 665):

     With a thought I tooke for Maudline
     & a cruse of cockle pottage.
     with a thing thus tall, skie blesse you all:
     I befell into this dotage.

Synonyms

• (to fall upon)
• (to happen) come to pass, occur, transpire; See also Thesaurus:happen
• (to happen to)

Derived terms

• befalling
• misbefall

Translations

Noun

befall (plural befalls)

1. Case; instance; circumstance; event; incident; accident.
   • 1495, William Caxton, Vitas Patrum:

     Or he had tolde al his befall.

   • 1990, India. Parliament. House of the People, India. Parliament. Lok Sabha, Lok Sabha debates:

     This is proposed to be done by moving necessary amendment in this befall to the Finance Bill.

   • 1994, Socialist Party (India), Janata: Volume 49:

     He said "I would advise people to cultivate frugal habits. I will not commit the crime of making them helpless by saying that they have no responsibility whatever in the befall of calamities like old age, illness, accident, etc. [...]"

   • 1996, Thomas Pfau, Rhonda Ray Kercsmar, Rhetorical and cultural dissolution in romanticism:

     [...], the word "care" asserting itself subliminally in somewhat the same way that "fall" does in the "befall" of "Infant Joy."

References

• befall in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• befall in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

Anagrams

• flabel

German

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /b??fal/
• Hyphenation: be?fall
• Rhymes: -al

Verb

befall

1. singular imperative of befallen

Swedish

Verb

befall

1. imperative of befalla.

English

Etymology

Originally "meet, meet in argument", borrowed from Middle French occurrer, from Latin occurr? (“run to meet, run against, befall, present itself”) from prefix ob- (“against”) + verb curr? (“run, hurry, move”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /??k??/
• (US) IPA^(key): /??k?/
• Rhymes: -??(?)

Verb

occur (third-person singular simple present occurs, present participle occurring, simple past and past participle occurred)

1. (intransitive) To happen or take place.
2. (intransitive) To present or offer itself.

3. (impersonal) To come or be presented to the mind; to suggest itself.
   • 1995, Theodore Kaczynski, Industrial Society and Its Future

     Apparently it never occurs to them that you can't make rapid, drastic changes in the technology and the economy of a society without causing rapid changes in all other aspects of the society as well, […]

4. (intransitive, sciences) To be present or found.

Synonyms

• (happen): belimp (obsolete), betide (obsolete), betime (obsolete), come to pass, happen, take place; See also Thesaurus:happen
• (present itself): appear, arise, come up
• (meet or come to the mind):
• (be present or found):

Related terms

• occurrent
• occurrence

Translations