prefigure
Americanverb (used with object)
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to show or represent beforehand by a figure or type; foreshadow.
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to picture or represent to oneself beforehand; imagine.
verb
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to represent or suggest in advance
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to imagine or consider beforehand
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of prefigure
1400–50; late Middle English < Late Latin praefigūrāre. See pre-, figure (v.)
Explanation
Something that is a sign of things to come can be said to prefigure the future thing — and usually not in a good way. Sleeping through your alarm Monday morning might prefigure your entire week — in other words, it might be a sign of the unlucky days ahead.English is rich in terms that have the basic meaning of "tell something about the future." Perhaps because we all wish we knew more about it! The Latin root of prefigure is praefigurare, from prae, "before," and figurare , "to form or shape."
Vocabulary lists containing prefigure
Florida's B.E.S.T. Common Prefixes: pre-
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
That certainly wasn’t the first time a Leonard Cohen song seemed to prefigure events that had not happened, or to capture a global state of mind before it fully coalesced.
From Salon ● Jan. 21, 2025
People who have received the shots two to four weeks earlier should watch for symptoms that may prefigure the onset of clotting.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 13, 2021
But Warner Bros has undergone a series of personnel shake-ups under Stankey that prefigure the HBO Max controversy.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 9, 2020
It tempers its poppy lushness with starker, harder music, although the burbling synth that runs throughout seems to prefigure New Order’s later direction.
From The Guardian ● Jul. 17, 2020
Yet he sat for an hour or more on the veranda, smoking many pipes and trying as he could to prefigure the future in the light of the night's happenings.
From The Quickening by Ashe, E. M.
The rumored price increases from Samsung were prefigured in a note on the stock by Citi analyst Peter Lee last week.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 6, 2026
This improbable gift was succeeded by a clock-radio—a Sony Dream Machine with a blue digital display in a sleek white cube that prefigured Apple’s austere aesthetic.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 11, 2026
He prefigured today’s globalized music economy long before it had language for itself, though his influence has often been oddly glossed over.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 25, 2026
Indeed, the epic “Rock Show” prefigured McCartney’s plans for conquering the rock ‘n’ roll box office.
From Salon ● Mar. 21, 2025
Even those finest and most beautiful forms of human emotion which we especially celebrate in poetry are to be found prefigured among the animals.
From A Review of the Systems of Ethics Founded on the Theory of Evolution by Williams, C. M.
That’s one way to start a book—bracing and bitter, conveying Mary Cain’s scorn for the athletic-shoe-and-sportswear giant while prefiguring her larger message that “sports normalizes cruelty.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 24, 2026
Aemond broke the fragile family supper truce by toasting his “strong” nephews, prefiguring battles that now seem imminent.
From New York Times ● Oct. 9, 2022
You mention them as prefiguring the activism of the Freedom Summer.
From Salon ● Apr. 10, 2022
In 2017, Democrats made unexpected gains in the House of Delegates with candidates who were predominantly women and minorities, prefiguring the national trend of more diverse candidate pools.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 22, 2021
So speaks Tiresias and is therein a kind of world-judge, prefiguring Minos of the last stage of Hades.
From Homer's Odyssey A Commentary by Snider, Denton Jaques
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
