to exercise authority over; rule, administer, direct, control, manage, etc.
to influence the action or conduct of; guide; sway: to govern public opinion
to hold in check; restrain; curb: to govern one's temper
to regulate the speed of (an automobile, etc.) by means of a governor
to be a rule or law for; determine: the scientific principles governing a phenomenon
Gram.: used as of prepositions with noun cases, esp. in highly inflected languages, and, in English, more loosely, of any interrelationship between forms, as that between a preposition and a following pronoun
to require (a word) to be in a certain case or mood