expect: [16] Someone who expects something literally ‘looks out’ for it. The word comes from Latin expectāre, a compound verb formed from the prefix ex- ‘out’ and spectāre ‘look’ (source of English spectacle, spectre, spectrum, and speculate). Already in Latin the literal ‘look out’ had shifted metaphorically to ‘look forward to, anticipate’ and ‘a(chǎn)wait’, meanings adopted wholesale by English (‘a(chǎn)wait’ has since been dropped). => espionage, spectacle, speculate, spy
expect (v.)
1550s, "wait, defer action," from Latin expectare/exspectare "await, look out for; desire, hope, long for, anticipate; look for with anticipation," from ex- "thoroughly" (see ex-) + spectare "to look," frequentative of specere "to look at" (see scope (n.1)).
Figurative sense of "anticipate, look forward to" developed in Latin and is attested in English from c. 1600. Also from c. 1600 as "regard as about to happen." Meaning "count upon (to do something), trust or rely on" is from 1630s. Used since 1817 as a euphemism for "be pregnant." In the sense "suppose, reckon, suspect," it is attested from 1640s but was regarded as a New England provincialism. Related: Expected; expecting.
雙語(yǔ)例句
1. Don't expect me to come and visit you there.
別指望我會(huì)去那兒看你。
來(lái)自柯林斯例句
2. "Will Joe be here at Christmas?" — "I expect so."