"avant la lettre" meaning in English

See avant la lettre in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Prepositional phrase

Etymology: Borrowed from French avant la lettre (literally “before the letter”). Etymology templates: {{bor|en|fr|avant la lettre|lit=before the letter}} French avant la lettre (literally “before the letter”) Head templates: {{head|en|prepositional phrase|head=avant la lettre}} avant la lettre, {{en-PP|head=avant la lettre}} avant la lettre
  1. (idiomatic) Before the term was coined (the term being a word or phrase used just previously in an anachronistic way) Tags: idiomatic Related terms: retronym, proto, proto- Translations (Translations): avant la lettre (Dutch), ennen sanan olemassaoloa (Finnish), avant la lettre (French), ante litteram (Italian)
    Sense id: en-avant_la_lettre-en-prep_phrase-4tn3V3lY Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Entries with translation boxes, Pages with 3 entries, Pages with entries, Terms with Dutch translations, Terms with Finnish translations, Terms with French translations, Terms with Italian translations, Pages with 3 entries, Pages with entries Disambiguation of Pages with 3 entries: 42 40 12 6 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 42 38 10 9
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      "name": "bor"
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          "_dis": "42 40 12 6",
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        {
          "text": "Suffragettes were feminists avant la lettre.\n(the word \"feminist\" did not exist during their era)",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1952, George Sarton, A History of Science:",
          "text": "Could the Greeks of that time, whose minds were frustrated and demoralized by defeat and misery, be expected to give a welcome to those premature Quakers and to those Tolstoyans “avant la lettre”?",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1973, Marlies Kronegger, Literary Impressionism:",
          "text": "How is it, then, that Flaubert was a somber impressionist avant la lettre, when the school of painters was remarkably cheerful with the exception of both Degas and Van Gogh?",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1998, Dominik Declercq, Writing Against the State: Political Rhetorics in Third and Fourth Century China, page 341:",
          "text": "as St Francis of Assisi was recently discovered to be an ecologist avant la lettre",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2007, Joan DeJean, The Essence of Style: How the French Invented High Fashion, Fine Food, Chic Cafes, Style, Sophistication, and Glamour, page 107:",
          "text": "a work with a title that is a marketing dream, pure Julia Child well avant la lettre: Le Cuisinier français, The French Chef.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2010, Stefano Evangelista, The Reception of Oscar Wilde in Europe, page 65:",
          "text": "One might even advance the case for Wilde's being a celebrity avant la lettre, famous partly for being famous",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2015 February 27, Laura Kipnis, “Sexual Paranoia Strikes Academe”, in The Chronicle of Higher Education:",
          "text": "You have to feel a little sorry these days for professors married to their former students. They used to be respectable citizens—leaders in their fields, department chairs, maybe even a dean or two—and now they’re abusers of power avant la lettre.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
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      "glosses": [
        "Before the term was coined (the term being a word or phrase used just previously in an anachronistic way)"
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      "id": "en-avant_la_lettre-en-prep_phrase-4tn3V3lY",
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        "(idiomatic) Before the term was coined (the term being a word or phrase used just previously in an anachronistic way)"
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      "related": [
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          "word": "retronym"
        },
        {
          "word": "proto"
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          "word": "proto-"
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      "tags": [
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      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "ennen sanan olemassaoloa"
        },
        {
          "code": "nl",
          "lang": "Dutch",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "avant la lettre"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "avant la lettre"
        },
        {
          "code": "it",
          "lang": "Italian",
          "sense": "Translations",
          "word": "ante litteram"
        }
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    }
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  "word": "avant la lettre"
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          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1952, George Sarton, A History of Science:",
          "text": "Could the Greeks of that time, whose minds were frustrated and demoralized by defeat and misery, be expected to give a welcome to those premature Quakers and to those Tolstoyans “avant la lettre”?",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1973, Marlies Kronegger, Literary Impressionism:",
          "text": "How is it, then, that Flaubert was a somber impressionist avant la lettre, when the school of painters was remarkably cheerful with the exception of both Degas and Van Gogh?",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1998, Dominik Declercq, Writing Against the State: Political Rhetorics in Third and Fourth Century China, page 341:",
          "text": "as St Francis of Assisi was recently discovered to be an ecologist avant la lettre",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2007, Joan DeJean, The Essence of Style: How the French Invented High Fashion, Fine Food, Chic Cafes, Style, Sophistication, and Glamour, page 107:",
          "text": "a work with a title that is a marketing dream, pure Julia Child well avant la lettre: Le Cuisinier français, The French Chef.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2010, Stefano Evangelista, The Reception of Oscar Wilde in Europe, page 65:",
          "text": "One might even advance the case for Wilde's being a celebrity avant la lettre, famous partly for being famous",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2015 February 27, Laura Kipnis, “Sexual Paranoia Strikes Academe”, in The Chronicle of Higher Education:",
          "text": "You have to feel a little sorry these days for professors married to their former students. They used to be respectable citizens—leaders in their fields, department chairs, maybe even a dean or two—and now they’re abusers of power avant la lettre.",
          "type": "quote"
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        "(idiomatic) Before the term was coined (the term being a word or phrase used just previously in an anachronistic way)"
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  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "ennen sanan olemassaoloa"
    },
    {
      "code": "nl",
      "lang": "Dutch",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "avant la lettre"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "avant la lettre"
    },
    {
      "code": "it",
      "lang": "Italian",
      "sense": "Translations",
      "word": "ante litteram"
    }
  ],
  "word": "avant la lettre"
}

Download raw JSONL data for avant la lettre meaning in English (3.9kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-12-21 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-12-04 using wiktextract (d8cb2f3 and 4e554ae). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

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