# detect
## English
### Pronunciation

* (UK) IPA: /dɪˈtɛkt/
* Audio (Southern England):(file)
* Rhymes: -ɛkt

### Etymology 1

From Latin detectus, perfect passive participle of detegere (“to uncover or disclose”), from de- + tegere (“to cover”); see tegument, tile, thatch.

#### Verb

detect (third-person singular simple present detects, present participle detecting, simple past and past participle detected)
* To discover or find by careful search, examination, or probing.
** 1960 June, “Talking of Trains: New B.R. research laboratory”, in Trains Illustrated, page 329:Diesel maintenance schedules are benefiting from work done on the magnificent Hilger & Watts electronic spectrograph for oil analysis, which detects minute quantities of metals in samples of used lubricating oil; [...].

##### Translations
#### Derived terms

* autodetect
* codetect
* detectability
* detectable
* detecter
* detectible
* detection
* detective
* detectograph
* detector
* immunodetect
* misdetect
* nondetect
* overdetect
* redetect
* underdetect
* undetectability

#### Related terms

* metal-detect

#### Descendants

* → Catalan: detectar
* → French: détecter
** → Dutch: detecteren
* → Portuguese: detectar, detetar (Portugal)
* → Romanian: detecta
* → Spanish: detectar

#### See also

* discover
* find
* stumble upon

#### Adjective

detect (not comparable)
* (obsolete) Detected.

### Etymology 2

Back-formation from detective.

#### Verb

detect (third-person singular simple present detects, present participle detecting, simple past and past participle detected)
* (intransitive, informal) To work or solve cases as a detective.
** 1926, Dorothy L. Sayers, Clouds of Witness (Lord Peter Wimsey; 2), T. Fisher Unwin, →ISBN, page 105:Parker would in all likelihood have done so; he was paid to detect and to do nothing else, and neither his natural gifts nor his education (at Barrow-in-Furness Grammar School) prompted him to stray into side-tracks at the beck of an ill-regulated imagination.
** 1978, Leslie Lonsdale-Cooper, Michael Turner, transl., Tintin in America (The Adventures of Tintin), Egmont, published 2012, →ISBN, page 45:Let me introduce myself: Mike MacAdam, hotel detective. / H-how d-’you do? / Mind if I begin detecting?
** 1991, Hillary Waugh, Hillary Waugh's Guide to Mysteries & Mystery Writing Novel, Writer's Digest Books, →ISBN, page 11:In a detective story, a detective detects; an active effort is made to determine who committed a given crime, and detecting the identity of a criminal could not be done until there were detectives.
** 2019 May 9, Ben Kenigsberg, “'Pokémon Detective Pikachu' Review: A Cat and (Electric) Mouse Game”, in The New York Times‎, archived from the original on 2022-12-17:That aversion is tested when he teams up with Pikachu (voiced by Ryan Reynolds), his father's detecting partner, after the father appears to have been killed in an accident.

### References

* “detect”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
* “detect”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
* “detect”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
* “detect”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.

### Anagrams

* dectet