From Old French surmis, past participle of surmetre, surmettre ("to accuse"), from sur- ("upon") + metre ("to put").

• (RP) IPA: /sɜːˈmaɪz/
• (America) IPA: /sɚˈmaɪz/

surmise

1. Thought, imagination, or conjecture, which may be based upon feeble or scanty evidence; suspicion; guess.

   Synonyms: Thesaurus:supposition

   surmises of jealousy or of envy

   This opinion, however, is merely a surmise, which may or may not be the case.

2. Reflection; thought; posit.
   • 1816 December 1, John Keats, “[Sonnets.] Sonnet XI. On First Looking into Chapman's Homer.”, in Poems, London: […] [Charles Richards] for C[harles] & J[ames] Ollier, […], published 3 March 1817, →OCLC ↗; reprinted in Poems (The Noel Douglas Replicas), London: Noel Douglas, 1927, →OCLC ↗, page 89 ↗:

     Then felt I like some watcher of the skies / When a new planet swims into his ken; / Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes / He star'd at the Pacific—and all his men / Look'd at each other with a wild surmise— / Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

• German: Vermutung, Mutmaßung
• Portuguese: suspeita
• Russian: подозре́ние

• Portuguese: imaginação

surmise (surmises, present participle surmising; simple past and past participle surmised)

1. (intransitive) To imagine or suspect; to conjecture; to posit with contestable premises.

   Synonyms: Thesaurus:suppose

   If, as I surmise, you see the ladies this evening, you might mention my intended visit.

• French: présumer, supposer, suspecter
• German: vermuten, mutmaßen, annehmen
• Italian: supporre
• Portuguese: suspeitar
• Russian: подозревать
• Spanish: suponer, conjeturar, presumir