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Harbinger definition

härbĭn-jər
harbingers
See word origin
Frequency:
To signal the approach of; presage.
verb
6
1
A person or thing that comes before to announce or give an indication of what follows; herald.
noun
3
1
The definition of a harbinger is something or someone who announces that something or someone is coming.

Thunder is an example of a harbinger of a rainstorm.

noun
2
0
(historical) An advance representative of an army or royal party, who arranged for lodging, entertainment, etc.
noun
1
0
To announce; to be a harbinger of.
verb
1
0
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To serve as harbinger of.
verb
0
0
A person or thing that foreshadows or foretells the coming of someone or something.
noun
0
0
One that indicates or foreshadows what is to come; a forerunner.
noun
1
2

Other Word Forms

Noun

Singular:
harbinger
Plural:
harbingers

Origin of harbinger

  • Middle English herbengar person sent ahead to arrange lodgings from Old French herbergeor from herbergier to provide lodging for from herberge lodging of Germanic origin koro- in Indo-European roots

    From American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition

  • Originally, a person that is sent in advance to provide lodgings. From Middle English herbergeour, from Old French herbergeor (> French hébergeur, from héberger (“to accommodate, put up”), from Frankish *heriberga (“lodging, inn”, literally “army shelter”), from Proto-Germanic *harjaz (“army”) + *bergô (“protection”). Compare German Herberge, Italian albergo, Dutch herberg, English harbour. More at here, borrow.

    From Wiktionary

Harbinger Sentence Examples

  • The people seemed to regard the American flag as the harbinger of a new era.

  • Damian raised an eyebrow, not about to humor the otherworldly harbinger of bad news.

  • At the opening of 1904 he was officially invited by Mr Deakin, the prime minister of the Commonwealth, to pay a visit to Australia, in order to expound his scheme, being promised an enthusiastic welcome "as the harbinger of commercial reciprocity between the mother country and her colonies."

  • This book may well be considered the harbinger of the next generation of community studies.

  • Of those species that frequent the North Atlantic, the common StormPetrel, Procellaria pelagica, a little bird which has to the ordinary eye rather the look of a Swift or Swallow, is the "Mother Carey's chicken" of sailors, and is widely believed to be the harbinger of bad weather; but seamen hardly discriminate between this and others nearly resembling it in appearance, such as Leach's or the Fork-tailed Petrel, Cymochorea leucorrhoa, a rather larger but less common bird, and Wilson's Petrel, Oceanites oceanicus, the type of the Family Oceanitidae mentioned above, which is more common on the American side.

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