spectre

Etymology

From French spectre, from Latin spectrum (“appearance, apparition”).

Pronunciation

• Rhymes: -ɛktə(ɹ)

Noun

spectre (plural spectres)

1. British standard spelling of specter.

   The spectre is a ghost of a decapitated young man.

   • 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The Communist Manifesto

     A spectre is haunting Europe — the spectre of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this spectre: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies.

   • 1849, Charlotte Brontë, Shirley

     To this extenuated spectre, perhaps, a crumb is not thrown once a year, but when ahungered and athirst to famine—when all humanity has forgotten the dying tenant of a decaying house—Divine Mercy remembers the mourner […]

Anagrams

• Sceptre, recepts, respect, restecp, scepter, sceptre, specter

Noun

spectre m (plural spectres)

1. ghost, specter

   Dans la nuit, il vit un spectre apparaître.

2. spectrum

   Le spectre de la lumière blanche est un spectre continu.

Further reading

• “spectre” in le Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Anagrams

• respect

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ˈspek.tre]

Noun

spectre n pl

1. plural of spectru