Hope

How to spell hope

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce hope

What does hope mean?

1. verbTo want something to happen while believing it is possible.
2. nounA feeling of expectation and desire for a particular thing to happen.

Hope in a sentence

• verb

  We hope for a dry weekend so the move can go ahead.

• noun

  The steady sales figures gave the staff fresh hope for their bonus.

• verb

  Many commuters hope that the new line will cut the journey time.

• noun

  Her only hope of finishing the report on time was an early start.

Where does hope come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Hope comes straight from the native Germanic stock of English, appearing in late Old English as 'hopa' (the noun) and 'hopian' (the verb), meaning to trust, to wish, or to expect with confidence. It has close cousins across the North Sea, including Dutch 'hoop' and German 'Hoffnung', which suggests the word was already widespread among the West Germanic peoples. Scholars are not entirely certain of the deeper root, since the word does not show up clearly in the very oldest layers of the related languages, but the family resemblance is unmistakable. Over the medieval period the sense settled into the modern blend of desire and expectation: to want something while believing it might actually happen. The spelling is mercifully simple, a short vowel-consonant-silent-e pattern, which is why this word almost never trips an adult writer.

How the word is built

• hope (a single Old English root; no prefix or suffix)