forespeak
English
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) IPA(key): /fɔːˈspiːk/
- Homophone: forspeak
- Hyphenation: fore‧speak
Verb
forespeak (third-person singular simple present forespeaks, present participle forespeaking, simple past forespoke, past participle forespoken)
- (obsolete, transitive) To foretell; to predict.
- My mother was half a witch; never anything that she forespake but came to pass. — Beaumont and Fletcher.
- 2003, Caroline Bicks, Midwiving Subjects in Shakespeare's England (Women and Gender in the Early Modern World), Aldershot, Hampshire; Burlington, Vt.: Ashgate Publishing, →ISBN, page 153:
- The same Henry of Ritchmond (after Henry the seavnth) I know not by what provydence or prophecy forsaw that his sonne Henry was not lyke to please god so well to have the kingdome established in his posterytye and thearfore matched his eldest Dawghter into Skotland thearby as yt wear forspeaking a happy conjunction of thease two noble realms […]
Usage notes
Not to be confused with forspeak (“to injure or cause bad luck through immoderate praise or flattery; to bewitch, to charm (and other senses)”).
Etymology 2
Alteration of forspeak.
Verb
forespeak (third-person singular simple present forespeaks, present participle forespeaking, simple past forespoke, past participle forespoken)
- Alternative form of forspeak.
Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for forespeak in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.)