beware

Etymology
From, , , forms of , equivalent to or. Compare 🇨🇬.

Verb

 * 1)  To use caution, pay attention to (used both with and without of).

Usage notes
The verb was traditionally used without of (e.g. "beware the ides of March", from Julius Caesar Act 1, scene 2, 15–19, by Shakespeare), but it is often used with the preposition today.

The verb beware has become a defective verb and now lacks forms such as the third-person singular simple present and the simple past. It can only be used imperatively (Beware of the dog!), subjunctively (It's important that he beware of the dog), or as an infinitive (You must beware of the dog or They told me to beware of the dog).

The inflected forms, , and are called obsolete in Fowler's Dictionary of Modern English Usage, along with the simple indicative "I beware". The forms and  are very rarely found in modern texts, though  is slightly less rare. These inflections are more likely to be found in very old texts.

The meanings of the obsolete inflected forms can be easily understood by replacing "beware" with the more modern equivalent consisting of a conjugated form of "be" and the word "wary". For example "bewares" means the same as "is wary", "bewared" the same as "was wary", etc.

Translations

 * Arabic: حَذَارِ,
 * Armenian:, զգուշացի՛ր
 * Azerbaijani: saqınmaq
 * Bulgarian:, пази се от
 * Catalan: anar amb compte
 * Chinese:
 * Mandarin:
 * Esperanto: atenti
 * Estonian:
 * Finnish:
 * French:
 * Galician:, mirar por, cavidar
 * Georgian: მორიდება, ფრთხილად ყოფნა, გაფრთხილება
 * German: sich hüten (vor)
 * Hungarian:
 * Icelandic: varast
 * Ingrian: kavvoa
 * Italian:, , fare attenzione
 * Latin:, videsis, vide sis, sis vide
 * Latvian:
 * Lithuanian:
 * Norwegian: passe seg (for)
 * Polish: strzeż się
 * Portuguese: precaver-se, prestar atenção
 * Romanian: (se) păzi (de)
 * Russian:
 * Spanish: tener cuidado, ser precavido
 * Swedish: akta sig (för)
 * Thai:
 * Ukrainian: стерегти́ся