foretaste
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
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foretastes,
present (3rd person singular)
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foretasted,
past participle, past
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foretasting
present participle
noun
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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foretastesimple
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foretastessimple
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have foretastedperfect
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has foretastedperfect
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am foretastingprogressive
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are foretastingprogressive
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is foretastingprogressive
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have been foretastingperfect progressive
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has been foretastingperfect progressive
Past
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foretastedsimple
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had foretastedperfect
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was foretastingprogressive
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were foretastingprogressive
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had been foretastingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of foretaste
First recorded in 1400–50, foretaste is from the late Middle English word fortaste. See fore-, taste
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 is a foretaste of what analysts say will be a growing pool of debt tied to data centers.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 12, 2025
That applies whether you think the current troubles are just a blip or a foretaste of the job losses that technological changes are bringing to the industry, she said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 13, 2024
“A foretaste of the future,” said Petteri Taalas, the secretary general of the World Meteorological Organization.
From New York Times ● Jul. 29, 2023
And this is almost surely just the leading edge of the crisis, a small foretaste of the many disasters to come.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 18, 2023
Immediately, two or three others cried out also, and a wind, a foretaste of that great down-pouring they awaited, swept the church.
From "Go Tell It on the Mountain" by James Baldwin
As spare and considered as their Morton Feldman score, these solos aren’t just foretastes of 1960s Judson Dance Theater; they could easily be the work of a present-day postmodernist like Beth Gill.
From New York Times ● Jun. 16, 2022
Shop windows, freshly decked, tempted the passerby with foretastes of the season's styles in gowns and hats and furs.
From Destiny by Charles Neville Buck
Such innocence in such darkness, such purity in such an embrace; such foretastes of heaven are possible only to childhood, and no immensity approaches the greatness of little children.
From The Man Who Laughs by Victor Hugo
What more can the finest poetry achieve in quickening the things of earth into tokens and foretastes of heaven, with glimpses of higher life and ethereal worlds.
From The Complete Book of Cheese by Robert Carlton Brown
They can prove to you how abundantly able he is to reward all trust and service, giving foretastes of heavenly bliss even in the midst of earthly warfare.
From A Knight of the Nineteenth Century by Edward Payson Roe
At the same time, Auburn University officials say the school is expected to maintain consistent undergraduate enrollment at about 25,000 students with no significant growth foretasted.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 10, 2019
Adam foretasted comfort for himself and his descendants.
From "East of Eden" by John Steinbeck
In that lonely little closet of his, Pierre foretasted all that this world hath either of praise or dispraise; and thus foretasting both goblets, anticipatingly hurled them both in its teeth.
From Pierre; or The Ambiguities by Herman Melville
For herself she was unafraid, she foretasted entire success.
From Red Masquerade by Louis Joseph Vance
Every detail of work and play is colored by expectation, as if the relief of vacation were already foretasted.
From For Greater Things; the story of Saint Stanislaus Kostka by William Terence Kane
Confident of success, they were foretasting gleefully the terror of the stream at sight of the blessed image entering its waters.
From The Torrent Entre Naranjos by Isaac Goldberg
She was already foretasting the dreariness of life without the critical, corrective, and withal stimulating presence of her elder child.
From Kildares of Storm by Eleanor Mercein Kelly
All her plans, all her dreams, all her sweet foretasting sprang up before her, mocking her; all the intolerable sympathy of her friends, all the secret laughter it would hide, came at her, twisting her.
From The Happy Warrior by A. S. M. (Arthur Stuart-Menteth) Hutchinson
"Am I the sun, dear?" he asked, foretasting the delight of listening to her simple answer.
From The Witch of Prague by F. Marion (Francis Marion) Crawford
We need much humility, wisdom, and love to perform the functions of foreshadowing and foretasting heaven within us.
From Christian Science by Mark Twain
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.
