foreshadowing

noun

fore·​shad·​ow·​ing fȯr-ˈsha-də-wiŋ 

plural foreshadowings

: an indication of what is to come

If the history of the world were a novel, the events so strikingly chronicled in the photographs in this book … would seem a foreshadowing of the recent events …

—Ralph Novak

On this merry Christmas evening, however, no fears or dim foreshadowings of any coming event clouded our hearts or faces.

—Lucy Maud Montgomery

also : the use of such indications (as in a work of literature)

And, further, Rose is a genuine cliff-hanger, or page-turner, full of foreshadowing … and all the tried and tricky methods of creating suspense.

—John Simon

Synonyms

• augury
• auspice
• boding
• foreboding
• omen
• portent
• prefiguring
• presage

Examples of foreshadowing in a Sentence

the hero's strange encounter with a grave digger is often seen as a foreshadowing of his own death

Recent Examples on the Web

The Dreamgirls star provided some foreshadowing of the big day in a November 2006 interview with Cosmopolitan. —Emy Lacroix, People.com, 4 Apr. 2025

Could this be a foreshadowing of how the Opening Day lineup might look? —Katie Woo, The Athletic, 24 Feb. 2025

But there’s also a bit of distracting stunt casting in the form of Kurt Russell as a corrupt mogul named Dob McCoy, who has a special ability to turn locals against each other and ruin their crops, his castor farm an ominous foreshadowing of hell-bent poisonings to come. —Ryan Lattanzio, IndieWire, 11 Mar. 2025

And some, with a bleak foreshadowing of what was to come, had written their names and the phone numbers of family members – on their chests. —Kate Bartlett, NPR, 18 Jan. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1587, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for foreshadowing

• overshadowing
• shadowing