Scare

Scare

Verb / noun · /skɛː/ · to frighten suddenly; a sudden feeling of alarm or panic

Definition

As a verb, to scare means to cause sudden fear or alarm in someone — to startle or frighten them, even if only briefly. The fear is typically sudden and unexpected rather than deep or prolonged. As a noun, a scare is a sudden fright or an episode that causes alarm — a health scare, a bomb scare, a scare on the stock market. The noun also carries a collective sense: a scare is not just a personal reaction but can describe a public episode of alarm that affects many people simultaneously.

Origin

Scare comes from Old Norse skirra, meaning to frighten or to cause to shy away. The Old Norse verb is related to the adjective skjarr, meaning shy, timid, or easily startled. The word entered Middle English during the Norse contact period and has been used in the sense of sudden fright ever since. The related word scary, meaning frightening or causing fright, developed later and is now more common in everyday informal speech, while scare retains its more neutral, direct quality.