Word.ws English Dictionary

How to use foretell in a sentence

13 example sentences · verb

Foretell means to predict; to tell (the future) before it occurs; to prophesy. Example: “This was a demise foretold.”

Examples of foretell by meaning

verbTo predict; to tell (the future) before it occurs; to prophesy.

  • This was a demise foretold.2025 September 8, Roger Cohen, “French Prime Minister Bayrou Loses Confidence Vote, Putting Pressure on Macron”, in The New York Times, New...

More sentences with foretell

  • Held captive by society against their own free wills, the precogs are destined to foretell disturbing precrimes.2002, Ethix: The Bulletin of the Institute for Business, Technology & Ethics, Issues 22-38. From the entry precrime
  • Therefore the Spirit and the Gospel will be found in the Christ, who was foretrusted, because foretold.1995, Ante-Nicene Fathers: Latin Christianity. From the entry foretrust
  • It has all been foretold, forelived, Tridib being, so to speak, the novel's ur-imagination, ur-hero, ur-narrator.1992, Mohan Lal, Encyclopaedia of Indian Literature: Sasay to Zorgot - Page 3936. From the entry ur-hero
  • A sun dog on each side of the sun foretell a bad storm in the night.1935, Harry Middleton Hyatt, “Weather”, in Folk-lore from Adams County Illinois, New York, N.Y.: Memoirs of the Alma Egan Hyatt…. From the entry sun dog
  • All of this is foretold in Revelation 6:7, natch.2025 October 16, Zach Vasquez, “‘Explicit and outrageous’: South Park is back with its most gratuitous episode since naked Trump”, in The…. From the entry natch
  • A Greek chorus of "antis" foretold a different future.2020 December 20, Deborah Cohen, “The Real Legacy of the Suffrage Movement”, in Jeffrey Goldberg, editor, The Atlantic, Washington, D.C.…. From the entry Greek chorus
  • He who was thus foretold, was also foretrusted.2012, The Sacred Writings of Tertullian. From the entry foretrust
  • Since mid-day their plangent, disquieting cries had foretold its approach.1919, Ronald Firbank, Valmouth (Duckworth hardback), page 49. From the entry plangent
  • From the dream in The interpretation of dreams, we derive the simple formula that dreams foretell the future insofar as the future is a perfect likeness of the past.1991 [1990], John Forrester, The Seductions of Psychoanalysis: Freud, Lacan and Derrida, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 95. From the entry Augustinian
  • Several farm maidservants meet to see their future lovers' spirits on Midsummer Eve, but see only the "fetch" or double of one of them, foretelling her death.1921, Sterling Andrus Leonard, “Bibliography of Plays for Reading in High Schools”, in Sterling Andrus Leonard, editor, The Atlantic Book…. From the entry fetch
  • Many foretell Michael's tide far and wide five nights on past the equinox when earls and ceorls keep harvest time with the high angel's feast remembered together throughout the land.2003, Cyril Roy Hart, Learning and culture in late Anglo-Saxon England and the influence of Ramsey Abbey on the major English monastic…. From the entry high angel
  • The Wide, Wide World, their foreplay foretells, will revolve around com-muting her incestuous passion; and commuting it will be a matter of soliciting and refusing a daughterly kiss—forever and ever.1992, G[eoffrey] M[ichael] Goshgarian, “His Sister’s Keeper: Susan Warner’s The Wide, Wide World”, in To Kiss the Chastening Rod: Domestic…. From the entry oscularly

Meaning of foretell

  1. verb To predict; to tell (the future) before it occurs; to prophesy.
  2. verb To tell (a person) of the future.

Full definition of foretell

Questions about foretell in a sentence

How do you use foretell in a sentence?
Foretell is used as a verb. For example: “This was a demise foretold.”
What is a short sentence with foretell?
“This was a demise foretold.”
What does foretell mean?
Foretell means to predict; to tell (the future) before it occurs; to prophesy.

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: foretell (page history and authors) and the entries each sentence comes from. Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws chose the sentences, left out offensive ones and quotations older than 1900, and marked the word in each. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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