portend

Borrowed from Latin portendere (“to foretell”), from por- (“forward”) + tendere (“to stretch”), present active infinitive of tendo.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /pɔːˈtɛnd/

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• (US) IPA^(key): /pɔɹˈtɛnd/
• Rhymes: -ɛnd

portend (third-person singular simple present portends, present participle portending, simple past and past participle portended)

1. (transitive) To serve as a warning or omen of.
   • 1671, John Milton, “The First Book”, in Paradise Regain’d. A Poem. In IV Books. To which is Added, Samson Agonistes, London: J M for John Starkey , →OCLC, page 4:

     A kingdom they portend thee, but what kingdom, / Real or allegoric, I discern not; Nor when: eternal sure--as without end,

2. (transitive) To signify; to denote.

   Let it be known that the Rapture portends the End of Days.

   • 1982 April 10, Jane Barnes, “Terror and Hope”, in Gay Community News, page 10:

     How alive these poems are with the visual specifics of what he so closely observes, how full of elegance, terror and hope. They portend a poet of major craft, of deep feeling, and of fine intelligence.

   • 2012 June 26, Genevieve Koski, “Music: Reviews: Justin Bieber: Believe”, in The A.V. Club‎, archived from the original on 6 August 2020:

     When the staccato, Neptunes-ian single “Boyfriend” was released in March, musical prognosticators were quick to peg the album it portended, Believe, as Justin Bieber’s Justified, a grown-and-sexy, R&B-centric departure that evolved millennial teenybopper Justin Timberlake into one of the unifying pop-music figures of the aughts.

• foreshadow
• presage

• portender
• portention, portendment

• portent
• portentive
• portentous

• harbinger

• dropnet, protend