commence

To begin, start.

Here the anthem doth commence:

His heaven commences ere the world be past!

To begin, start.

The speeches commenced three days of workshops, seminars, and cultural activities.

To begin to be, or to act as.

[…] he furnish’d me with a Gun, Cartouch-box, and Powder-horn, &c. and thus accouter’d I commenc’d Soldier.

When we are wearied of the trouble of prosecuting crimes at the bar, we commence judges ourselves […]

To take a degree at a university.

[…] I question whether the Formality of Commencing was used in that Age: inclining rather to the negative, that such Distinction of Graduates was then unknown […]

[…] was admitted a minor fellow of his college 4 Oct. 1591, a major fellow 11 March 1591-2, and commenced M.A. in 1592.