Where does “suspect” come from?
Suspect comes from Old French suspect, from Latin suspectus, past participle of suspicere meaning "to look up at or regard with suspicion," formed from Latin sub- "under" and specere "to look."
suspect (English): To imagine or suppose to be true, or to exist,...
Definitions
- To imagine or suppose to be true, or to exist,...
Ancestry of “suspect”, step by step
| Step | Language | Word | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Middle French | suspect | — |
| 2 | Old French | suspect | — |
| 3 | Latin | suspectus | mistrusted, suspected, having been suspected;... |
| 4 | Latin | suspiciō | to look up at or to |
| 5 | Latin | suspicere | second-person singular present active subjunctive... |
| 6 | Latin | specere | present active infinitive of speciō;... |
| 7 | Latin | specio | I observe, watch, look at |
| 8 | Proto-Italic | spekjō | to observe, to see |
| 9 | Proto-Indo-European | spéḱyeti | to be looking at, to keep looking at |
| 10 | Proto-Indo-European | speḱ- | to see, to look, to observe |