Definition of await

The word "await" comes from the old French verb "estre"; "es-tre," pronounced as "estre," meant "to be" or "to exist". In the Middle English period, this French verb was loaned to English, and its form was "este." Later, to indicate a temporal delay, and especially the expectation of someone's arrival, a word was added to it, and as a result, the original verb transformed into "avouen," which is pronounced as "avowan." In this new form, "a" was used to signify a word denoting the notion of delay, while "owen" was part of the old English word "ganian," which meant "to begin;" "a-oven" was synonymous with "on begin" in this newly-formed word. With time, "avouen" changed and eventually evolved into "awaten," which is pronounced as "awatyn." This transformation resulted from the A-V shifts that occurred in the English language, and linguists believe that this change has been brought by the Anglo-Saxon invasion, which occurred in 449 AD. Eventually, the word "await" came into being from "awatyn" in the late Middle English period. The original meaning of "awatyn" might have been similar to that of "await" since it implied waiting and noble anticipation too.