specter

noun

1. (US)A ghostly apparition, a phantom.

   “A specter haunted the cemetery at the old Vasquez manor.”

   “Nevertheleſſe, they which ſhould ſee thoſe Iſles thus to moove in this manner, not knowing before that the ſame were naturall: they would entertaine many and diverſe apprehenſions in their fantaſie, & would imagine that they ſawe a thing very ſtrange and prodigious, and ſuch as did very neere approach to the nature of ſome Specter [translating spectre] and viſion.”

2. (US, figuratively)A threatening mental image; an unpleasant prospect

   “A specter is haunting Europe — the specter of communism. All the powers of old Europe have entered into a holy alliance to exorcise this specter: Pope and Tsar, Metternich and Guizot, French Radicals and German police-spies.”

   “Already, the specter of higher interest rates was causing the housing market to seize up.”

   “Thailand's Constitutional Court on Wednesday dismissed Prime Minister Srettha Thavisin for appointing to his cabinet a former lawyer who served jail time, raising the spectre of more political upheaval and a reset of the governing alliance.”

   “Instead of three co-equal branches acting as a check on each other, power has become increasingly concentrated over the years in the White House – a trend that is now being supercharged under Mr. Trump in ways that, to critics, raise the specter of authoritarianism.”

3. (US)Any of certain species of dragonfly of the genus Boyeria, family Aeshnidae.