Also 5 begetare, 6 begettor. [f. BEGET v. + -ER1.]
1. One who begets; a procreator.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 28/2. Begetare, as a fathyr, genitor. Begetare, as mothere, genitrix.
1587. Fenner, Def. Ministers (1587), 126. The begettor of this base-borne childe.
1616. Chapman, Musæus, 200. Blest was thy great begetter; blest was she Whose womb did bear thee.
1875. G. Smith, Assyr. Discov., 321. Esarhaddon, king of Assyria,… my begetter.
2. fig. and transf. The agent that originates, produces or occasions.
1587. Golding, De Mornay, iii. 28. The onely one God … the Begetter of the Soules of the other Gods.
1606. Shaks., Sonnets (Inscr.), To the onlie begetter of these insuing sonnets.
1637. Bastwick, Litany, III. 11. The word of God is both the begetter of faith, and the increaser of it.
1884. Pall Mall Gaz., 2 Aug., 4/2. Dr. Alfred Wright, the ostensible begetter of these very light and graphic sketches of Servian campaigning.
