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Webster 1913 Edition


Portend

Por-tend′

,
Verb.
T.
[
imp. & p. p.
Portended
;
p. pr. & vb. n.
Portending
.]
[L.
portendre
,
portentum
, to foretell, to predict, to impend, from an old preposition used in comp. +
tendere
to stretch. See
Position
,
Tend
.]
1.
To indicate (events, misfortunes, etc.) as in future; to foreshow; to foretoken; to bode; – now used esp. of unpropitious signs.
Bacon.
Many signs
portended
a dark and stormy day.
Macaulay.
2.
To stretch out before.
[R.]
“Doomed to feel the great Idomeneus’ portended steel.”
Pope.
Syn. – To foreshow; foretoken; betoken; forebode; augur; presage; foreshadow; threaten.

Webster 1828 Edition


Portend

PORTEND'

,
Verb.
T.
[L. portendo; por; Eng. fore, and tendo, to stretch.] To foreshow; to foretoken; to indicate something future by previous signs.
A moist and cool summer portends a hard winter.

Definition 2024


portend

portend

English

Verb

portend (third-person singular simple present portends, present participle portending, simple past and past participle portended)

  1. (transitive) To serve as a warning or omen.
    • John Milton, Paradise Lost
      A kingdom they portend thee, but what kingdom, / Real or allegoric, I discern not; Nor when: eternal sure--as without end,
  2. (transitive) To signify; to denote.
    Let it be known that the Rapture portends the End of Days.
    • 2012 June 26, Genevieve Koski, “Music: Reviews: Justin Bieber: Believe”, in The Onion AV Club:
      When the staccato, Neptunes-ian single “Boyfriend” was released in March, musical prognosticators were quick to peg the album it portended, Believe, as Justin Bieber’s Justified, a grown-and-sexy, R&B-centric departure that evolved millennial teenybopper Justin Timberlake into one of the unifying pop-music figures of the aughts.

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