foretide

English

Etymology

From fore- +‎ tide.

Noun

foretide (plural foretides)

1. (rare, literal, figurative) An early tide (tidal surge).
   • 1989, Taylor Branch, Parting the Waters: America in the King Years 1954-63, page 771:

     He and the other leaders directed the crowds into the mass meeting at St. James Baptist Church, which was swamped long before nightfall. The movement was becoming a tempest. A foretide of one event churned into the backwash of others […]

2. (rare) A prior or previous period of time.

   Synonym: foretime

   • 1937, Walter V. Kell, Grover F. Brown, Strip Cropping for Soil Conservation:

     Older farmers coming from the East in the foretide of settlement, shook their heads dubiously at the idea of cropping the same land year after year to the one crop, corn.