Standard Lemma guide

preteriteness

noun · 1 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

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1

noun

Meaning 1

The quality or state of being past.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Usage: uncountable

Examples

  • c. 1851-1852, James Russell Lowell, Leaves from My Journal in Italy and Elsewhere A valley in the moon could scarce have been lonelier , could scarce have suggested more strongly the feeling of preteriteness and extinction

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

From preterite + -ness.