spectre
noun/ˈspektə(r)/
/ˈspektər/
(US English specter)
- spectre (of something) something unpleasant that people are afraid might happen in the future
- The country is haunted by the spectre of civil war.
- These weeks of drought have once again raised the spectre of widespread famine.
Extra Examples- The terrible spectre of civil war hung over the country once again.
- Wall Street's collapse raised spectres of the 1987 stock market crash.
- an attempt to exorcize the spectre of poverty
- the looming spectre of a financial crisis
- the twin spectres of addiction and violence
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadjective- grim
- ominous
- old
- …
- evoke
- invoke
- raise
- …
- hang over somebody/something
- haunt somebody/something
- hover over somebody/something
- …
- spectre of
- (literary) a ghost
- Was he a spectre returning to haunt her?
Word Originearly 17th cent.: from French spectre or Latin spectrum ‘image, apparition’, from specere ‘to look’.
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spectre