scare
/skɛɚ/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.07 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
1
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
Example Sentences
- "Johnny had a bad scare last night."
- "England were held to a draw after surviving a major scare against Switzerland as they were forced to come from two goals behind to earn a point in the Euro 2012 qualifier at Wembley."
- "a food-poisoning scare"
- "But I admit the possibility of their being used as "scares" for either birds of prey or snakes, or both."
- "Did it scare you when I said "Boo!"?"
- "That cannot be; the noise of thy crossbow / Will scare the herd, and so my shoot is lost."
Etymology
From Middle English sker, skere (“terror, fright”), from the verb Middle English skerren (“to frighten”) (see below).
Origin
Word Breakdown
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /skɛɚ/
- British English: /skɛə/
Usage
Inflected Forms
scares (plural)
scares (present, singular)
scaring (participle, present)
scared (participle, past)
scared (past)
more scare (comparative)
most scare (superlative)