Ghost

How to spell ghost

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce ghost

What does ghost mean?

1. nounThe supposed spirit of a dead person appearing to the living.
2. verbTo suddenly end all communication with someone without explanation.

Ghost in a sentence

• noun

  The old hotel is rumoured to be haunted by a ghost.

• verb

  It is unprofessional for a recruiter to ghost a candidate after the interview.

• noun

  The children dressed as a ghost for the party.

• verb

  He decided to ghost the seller who kept missing their meetings.

Where does ghost come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Ghost descends from the Old English 'gast', which meant soul, spirit, or even breath, the invisible animating force of a living person. That word came from a Germanic root shared with the Dutch 'geest' and German 'Geist', both still meaning spirit or mind. For centuries English wrote it without the 'h', as 'gast' and later 'gost'. The silent 'gh' was introduced in the late 1400s, most likely by William Caxton and his Flemish-trained printers, who modelled the spelling on the Dutch 'gheest'; that printer's habit is exactly why we now write a letter we do not pronounce. The older 'breath of life' sense survives in the religious phrase 'Holy Ghost' and in the expression 'to give up the ghost', while the everyday meaning narrowed to a visible spirit of the dead.

How the word is built

• ghost (a single Germanic root meaning spirit or soul; the silent 'gh' spelling was added later under Flemish influence)