guetter

French

Etymology

Inherited from Old French gaitier, guaitier, from Frankish *wahtōn, *wahtjan (“to watch, guard”), derivative of *wahta (“guard, watch”), from Proto-Germanic *wahtwō (“guard, watch”), from Proto-Indo-European *weǵ- (“to be fresh, cheerful, awake”). Compare English wait, ultimately from the same origin through an Anglo-Norman/Old Northern French variant.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ɡɛ.te/, /ɡe.te/

• audio

  (file)

• Homophones: guettai, guetté, guettée, guettées, guettés, guettez, gaieté

Verb

guetter

1. (transitive) to watch (intently), to watch for, to lie in wait

   Near-synonym: épier

   Le chat guette la souris. ― The cat lies in wait for the mouse.

   Des gendarmes le guettent. ― Gendarmes are lying in wait for him.

   • 1947, “C'est si bon”, André Hornez (lyrics), Henri Betti (music):

     C’est si bon / De guetter dans ses yeux

     It's so good / To look into our eyes

2. (transitive, figurative) to await in order to seize

   guetter une occasion ― to wait for an opportunity

3. (transitive, figurative) to menace, to loom (to appear in a threatening form)

   La mort le guette. ― Death hangs over him.

   • 1997, Bernard Fauconnier, chapter 3, in Kaïros, Grasset:

     J’avais acheté une vieille 4L dont les cardans exténués rendaient d’inquiétants sons de castagnettes et je roulais des journées entières sur des routes où la mort guettait à chaque virage.

     I had bought an old 4L whose worn-out joints were worryingly making sounds like castanets, and I drove for whole days on roads where death seemed to lurk around every corner.

Conjugation

Derived terms

• guetteur

Related terms

• guet-apens (“ambush”)
• guet

Descendants

• Saint Dominican Creole French: gueté

Further reading

• “guetter”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé , 2012.
• “guetter” in Émile Littré, Dictionnaire de la langue française, 1872–1877.