Standard Lemma guide

prescient

adj · 2 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.

  • Received-Pronunciation: /ˈpɹɛsiənt/
  • Received-Pronunciation, dated: /ˈpɹiːʃiənt/
  • Received-Pronunciation: Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
  • General-American: /ˈpɹɛʃ(i)ənt/
  • General-American: /ˈpɹiːʃ(i)ənt/
  • US, rare: /ˈpɹɛsiənt/
  • Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
  • CMU ARPABET: P R EH1 S IY0 AH0 N T Digits mark lexical stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.

1

adj

Meaning 1

Exhibiting or possessing prescience: having knowledge of, or seemingly able to correctly predict, events before they take place.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: clairvoyant, foreknowing, foreseeing, prescious, prescientific, prevoyant

Antonyms: unforeseeing

2

adjective satellite

Meaning 2

perceiving the significance of events before they occur-R.H.Rovere

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

Examples

  • extraordinarily prescient memoranda on the probable course of postwar relations

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Latin praesciēns (“foreknowing; foretelling, predicting”), present participle of) Latin praesciō (“to foreknow”), from prae- (prefix meaning ‘before; in front’) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *preh2- (“before; in front”)) + sciō (“to know, understand; to have knowledge of”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *skey- (“to dissect; to split”)). The word is cognate with Middle French prescient (modern French prescient (“prescient”)), Italian presciente (“prescient”). By surface analysis, pre- (“earlier in time, beforehand”) + scient (“knowing, aware”).

Across languages

Translations

23 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Bulgarian: предвидлив (predvidliv) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Bulgarian: далновиден (dalnoviden) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Catalan: prescient — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Chinese Mandarin: 預知的 /预知的 (yùzhīde) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Czech: jasnozřivý — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Finnish: laajanäköinen — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • French: prescient — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • German: hellsichtig — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • German: vorausschauend — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • German: vorausahnend — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • German: vorherwissend — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Ancient Greek: προγνωστικός (prognōstikós) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Hindi: दूरदर्शी (dūrdarśī) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Italian: presciente — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Latin: praescius — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Norwegian Bokmål: forutseende — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Portuguese: presciente — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Russian: дальновидный (dalʹnovidnyj) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Spanish: presciente — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Swedish: framsynt — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Swedish: förutseende — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Ukrainian: передбачливий (peredbačlyvyj) — exhibiting or possessing prescience
  • Ukrainian: пророчий (proročyj) — exhibiting or possessing prescience