to lie in wait
8
6.8
- phrasal verb
- /laɪ ɪn weɪt/
:
emboscar
- A dog lay in wait for me as I sat on the steps of a Catholic convent.
Examples
-
The hunter decided to lie in wait near the river to catch a deer.
-
Before the ambush, the soldiers lie in wait in the tall grass.
-
I lay in wait for him up the lane, not far from here.
Fiction book (2002) -
We're going to lie in wait for Hamegg.
-
If you want to lie in wait for someone, that's the place to do it.
Fiction book (1991) -
The Islamic warriors set fire to the homes of their "soft targets" and lay in wait at the villages' exit points.
Blog text (3) -
Our carriers will lie in wait northeast of Midway.
-
They always lie in wait to attack and plunder ships on the high seas.
Academic text (2010) -
Condit calmly lay in wait, just missing with an overhand right as St-Pierre moved in.
Blog text (14) -
She chose to lie in wait behind the bushes to surprise her friend at the party.
Synonyms
133
5.2
To attack a person or animal by hiding and surprising them
111
4.5
To attack someone suddenly to catch them off guard
104
5.5
To stay hidden and move secretly to watch or frighten people
15
4.0
To surprise someone so they are not ready to react
2
9.0
To attack someone suddenly from a hidden place
2
8.6
To stop someone unexpectedly to speak to or attack them
To hide and then suddenly attack someone
Antonyms
How Stealthy
Surface Forms
Morphology
The parts 'lie' + 'in' + 'wait' transparently signal staying in a position and waiting, so a B1 learner could infer a general sense of remaining somewhere to wait. However the specific sense of hiding with hostile intent or ambushing someone is a specialized, conventionalized meaning not fully predictable from the literal constituents, so the expression is only partially transparent.
Etymology
Lie in wait comes from a simple hunting image: a hunter or an animal would lie hidden in the grass and wait very quietly until it could jump out. So, it means 'to hide and wait' to make a 'surprise attack'.