guest
/ɡɛst/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: 4.58 in modern English
6
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A recipient of hospitality, especially someone staying by invitation at the house of another.
noun
An invited visitor or performer to an institution or to a broadcast.
noun
An inquiline.
verb
As a musician: to play as a guest, providing an instrument that a band/orchestra does not normally have in its line up (for instance, percussion in a string band).
Intransitive verb
Example Sentences
- "The guests were let in by the butler."
- "We expressed our readiness, and in ten minutes were in the station wagon, rolling rapidly down the long drive, for it was then after nine. We passed on the way the van of the guests from Asquith."
- "Guests must vacate their rooms by 10 o'clock on their day of departure."
- "special guest"
- "The guest for the broadcast was a leading footballer."
- "During the '60s, he guested as off-beat characters on TV shows like "The Asphalt Jungle," "Bus Stop," and "The Detectives.""
Etymology
From Middle English gest, from Old Norse gestr, which replaced or was merged with Old English ġiest, both from Proto-Germanic *gastiz, from Proto-Indo-European *gʰóstis (“stranger, guest, host, someone with whom one has reciprocal duties of hospitality”). Doublet of host, from Latin. Cognates West-Germanic: :* Bavarian Gåst (“guest”) :* Dutch gast (“guest”) :* German Gast (“guest”) :* Luxembourgish Gaascht (“guest”) :* Vilamovian gost (“guest”) :* Yiddish גאַסט (gast, “guest”) North-Germanic: :* Danish gæst (“guest, visitor”) :* Faroese and Icelandic gestur (“guest”) :* Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk gjest (“guest”) :* Swedish gäst (“guest”) East-Germanic: :* Gothic 𐌲𐌰𐍃𐍄𐍃 (gasts, “guest”)