Portent
noun
A sign or warning that something, usually something bad, will happen.
The crumbling wall was a portent of the city's future destruction.
Often appears as...
- a portent of doom
- ominous portent
noun
In literature, a portent is a sign that something, usually a significant or catastrophic event, is about to happen.
The author often uses birds as portents of tragic events in the story.
Often appears as...
- literary portent
- tragic portent
Usage tips
Literary
noun
A sign or warning that something, usually something bad, will happen.
The crumbling wall was a portent of the city's future destruction.
Often appears as...
- a portent of doom
- ominous portent
noun
In literature, a portent is a sign that something, usually a significant or catastrophic event, is about to happen.
The author often uses birds as portents of tragic events in the story.
Often appears as...
- literary portent
- tragic portent
Usage tips
Literary
Definition 1 of 2
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Association
Portent usually implies a bad outcome, not just any future event.
The dark clouds were a portent of the approaching storm.
Pro Tip 2/3Context Sensitivity
Use 'portent' in situations where the future event has meaningful impact.
Investors saw the CEO's resignation as a portent for the company.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Always Literal
Sometimes 'portent' refers to vague feelings or intuitions of ill-omen.
I felt a portent of dread before hearing the bad news.
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Association
Portent usually implies a bad outcome, not just any future event.
The dark clouds were a portent of the approaching storm.
Pro Tip 2/3Context Sensitivity
Use 'portent' in situations where the future event has meaningful impact.
Investors saw the CEO's resignation as a portent for the company.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Always Literal
Sometimes 'portent' refers to vague feelings or intuitions of ill-omen.
I felt a portent of dread before hearing the bad news.
Pro Tip 1/3Negative Association
Portent usually implies a bad outcome, not just any future event.
The dark clouds were a portent of the approaching storm.
Pro Tip 2/3Context Sensitivity
Use 'portent' in situations where the future event has meaningful impact.
Investors saw the CEO's resignation as a portent for the company.
Pro Tip 3/3Not Always Literal
Sometimes 'portent' refers to vague feelings or intuitions of ill-omen.
I felt a portent of dread before hearing the bad news.
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Video examples
Could comets be the...
by a passing comet. So, rather than an omen of death, the comet that first brought amino acids to Earth could have been a portent of life, a prediction of a distant future, where creatures of stardust
Video examples
Could comets be the...
by a passing comet. So, rather than an omen of death, the comet that first brought amino acids to Earth could have been a portent of life, a prediction of a distant future, where creatures of stardust
Example 1 of 1
Quote examples
David Olusoga
British Historian
The primitive fight-or-flight regions of our mammalian brains react to immediate danger. We instinctively run from an avalanche but the gradual retreat of a glacier, the portent of the far greater danger of rising temperatures and rising oceans, just doesn't get through to us in the same way.
Quote examples
Sherwin B. Nuland
American Scientist
There is, to be sure, sometimes only a small difference between being alert to possible danger and allowing oneself to become terrified to the point of paralysis by seeming or imagined portents.
Quote examples
J. G. Ballard
British Author
During the 1960s, the Shanghai of my childhood seemed a portent of the media cities of the future, dominated by advertising and mass circulation newspapers and swept by unpredictable violence.
Quote examples
Bobbie Ann Mason
American Novelist
My mother watched the skies at evening for a portent of the morrow. A cloud that went over and then turned around and came back was an especially bad sign.
Quote examples
Peter Conrad
The historian's job is to aggrandize, promoting accident to inevitability and innocuous circumstance to portent.
Quote examples
Agnes de Mille
American Dancer
Modern dancers give a sinister portent about our times.
Quote examples
Larry McMurtry
American Writer
Self-parody is the first portent of age.
Quote examples
David Olusoga
British Historian
The primitive fight-or-flight regions of our mammalian brains react to immediate danger. We instinctively run from an avalanche but the gradual retreat of a glacier, the portent of the far greater danger of rising temperatures and rising oceans, just doesn't get through to us in the same way.
Quote examples
Sherwin B. Nuland
American Scientist
There is, to be sure, sometimes only a small difference between being alert to possible danger and allowing oneself to become terrified to the point of paralysis by seeming or imagined portents.
Quote examples
J. G. Ballard
British Author
During the 1960s, the Shanghai of my childhood seemed a portent of the media cities of the future, dominated by advertising and mass circulation newspapers and swept by unpredictable violence.
Quote examples
Bobbie Ann Mason
American Novelist
My mother watched the skies at evening for a portent of the morrow. A cloud that went over and then turned around and came back was an especially bad sign.
Quote examples
Peter Conrad
The historian's job is to aggrandize, promoting accident to inevitability and innocuous circumstance to portent.
Quote examples
Agnes de Mille
American Dancer
Modern dancers give a sinister portent about our times.
Quote examples
Larry McMurtry
American Writer
Self-parody is the first portent of age.
Example 1 of 7
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