Word.ws English Dictionary

foreshow

/fɔːˈʃəʊ/

foreshow verb: to show in advance; to foretell, predict.

Verb

foreshow (third-person singular simple present foreshows, present participle foreshowing, simple past foreshowed, past participle foreshown)

  1. (archaic, transitive) To show in advance; to foretell, predict.
    • Amid his senses' giddy wheel, / Did he not desperate impulse feel, / Headlong to plunge himself below, / And meet the worst his fears foreshow?— […]1810, Walter Scott, “Canto II. The Island.”, in The Lady of the Lake; […], Edinburgh: […] [James Ballantyne and Co.] for John Ballantyne and Co.; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, and Orme, and William...
    • What could the soothsayer foreshow that we knew not before? The future is written in the past; and if we prophesy, it is with eyes that look behind.1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XXX, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 314
  2. (obsolete, transitive) To foreshadow or prefigure.
    • But if the rays break forth out of the middle, or dispersed, and its exterior body, or the out parts of it, be covered with clouds, it foreshows great tempests both of wind and rain.1841, Francis Bacon, Basil Montagu, The Works of Francis Bacon, Lord Chancellor of England

Noun

UK/ˈfɔːʃəʊ/

foreshow (plural foreshows)

  1. (obsolete) A manifestation in advance; a prior indication.
    • The fore-shew of their inclination whilest they are young is so uncertaine […] that it is very hard, (yea for the wisest) to ground any certaine judgement […]., Folio Society, 2006, vol.1, p.139

Forms of foreshow

Verb
third-person singular presentforeshows
present participleforeshowing
pastforeshowed
past participleforeshown
alternative formforeshew
Noun
pluralforeshows

Origin of foreshow

From Middle English foreschewen, from Old English forescēawian (“to foreshow, foresee; preordain, decree, appoint; provide, furnish with”), equivalent to fore- + show. Cognate with Dutch voorschouwen, German vorschauen.

From fore- + show.

Words formed from foreshow

Words that rhyme with foreshow

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about foreshow

What does foreshow mean?
Foreshow means to show in advance; to foretell, predict.
What part of speech is foreshow?
Foreshow can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce foreshow?
Foreshow is pronounced /fɔːˈʃəʊ/ (UK).
What is the past tense of foreshow?
The past tense of foreshow is foreshowed.

Words near foreshow in the dictionary

  1. foreshortens
  2. foreshot
  3. foreshots
  4. foreshoulder
  5. foreshoulders
  6. foreshow
  7. foreshowed
  8. foreshower
  9. foreshowers
  10. foreshowing
  11. foreshowings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: foreshow (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-foreshow.wav.

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