forerun

English

Etymology

Verb

forerun (third-person singular simple present foreruns, present participle forerunning, simple past foreran, past participle forerun)

To run in front.
- 1969, Maya Angelou, I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, New York: Bantam, 1971, Chapter 22, p. 131,
  Bailey still sat, doubled over his book […] A finger forerunning his eyes along the page.
To precede; to forecast or foreshadow.
- 1597, William Shakespeare, Richard II, Act II, Scene 4,
  These signs forerun the death or fall of kings.
- 1859-85, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, "Guinevere", Idylls of the King, Chicago: W.B. Conkey, 1900, pp. 325-6,
  And in herself she moan’d, ‘Too late, too late!’ / Till in the cold wind that foreruns the morn, / A blot in heaven, the Raven, flying high, / Croak’d, […]
- 1924, Herman Melville, Billy Budd, London: Constable & Co., Chapter 5,
  Discontent foreran the Two Mutinies, and more or less it lurkingly survived them.

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