presentiment

Etymology

Most dictionaries take it as borrowed from French presentiment,^{[2][3][4][5][6]} an obsolete spelling of pressentiment,^[4][5][3] from pressentir (“to have a foreboding”),^[2][3][4] from Latin praesentiō (“to sense beforehand”),^[2][3][7] from prae- (“before”) and sentiō (“to feel, perceive”).^[2][3][7] The OED, in its revision of 2007, instead treats it as formed within English from pre- and sentiment, after the French noun, which it dates to 1572 as Middle French and to 1611 in Cotgrave in the spelling presentiment;^[8] Hoad likewise analyses the French word with sentiment.^[9] The American Heritage Dictionary refers the Latin verb to the root Proto-Indo-European *sent-.^[7]

Earliest recorded meaning

An intuitive feeling about the future: 1663, in a translation by J. D. of Péréfixe.^[8][6] Older dictionaries have later dates: 1714 in Barnhart and Etymonline,^[2][3] and the early 18th century in the Shorter Oxford and the Oxford Dictionary of English.^[10][11]

Semantic evolution

Cotgrave glossed the French word as a "fore-feeling".^[12][13] In English it has meant a vague impression of what is about to happen, often with no definite foundation,^[8][6] and especially a foreboding that some misfortune is coming.^[3][10][6] For a time it could also mean a preconceived idea, from Lord Chesterfield in 1751 until 1872.^[8][10] The OED compares the older English nouns presension and presensation.^[8]

Timeline

• 1663 – an intuitive expectation of something about to happen.^[8][6]
• 1751 – a preconceived idea or opinion (obsolete by 1872).^[8]
• early 19th century – adjective presentimental.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. A feeling or impression that something is about to happen, with no clear basis; a premonition: She had a presentiment that the letter would never arrive.^[14][6][8]
2. Specifically, a foreboding of something unpleasant or disastrous.^[6][10][3]
3. (obsolete, 1751–1872) A preconceived idea or opinion.^[8][10]

Word family

• presentimental

Related words

• sentiment
• sense
• sentient
• presentient

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d e f g Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b c The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
9. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
10. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
13. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
14. ^ Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins