pest

CEFRB2

/pɛst/

noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    noun

    An insect or animal that damages plants, food, or property.

  2. 02

    noun

    An annoying person or thing.

Examples

  • Dammit, that pest Nagisa, she really went and snitched on me to the teachers.

  • This farmer relies on beneficial insects for pest control.

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
1
Citations
2
Synonyms
1

Deep Dive

noun

Extra meanings
  1. An annoying person, a nuisance.

  2. Any destructive insect that attacks crops or livestock; an agricultural pest.

  3. A pestilence, i.e. a deadly epidemic, a deadly plague.

More examples

In context
  • Get off me you little pest!

  • On a drizzly mid-January evening, I stood at the arches of the wall of Buda Castle, overlooking the Danube and the 19th-century Chain Bridge that links Buda with Pest.

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

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Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

noun

In the 16th century in the sense of "pestilence" and specifically bubonic plague from Middle French peste (“pestilence”) (whence French peste). The other meanings are recorded soon after. Ultimately from Latin pestis.