adumbrate

verb

ˈa-dəm-ˌbrāt How to pronounce adumbrate (audio)
Definition of adumbratenext
as in to foreshadow
to give a slight indication of beforehand the strife in Bloody Kansas in the 1850s adumbrated the civil war that would follow

Synonyms & Similar Words

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Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of adumbrate In between, works by contemporaries complicate superficial ideas about his meteoric genius, and small, delicate drawings teem with an abundance of ideas — paintings never made, thoughts adumbrated then abandoned. — Philip Kennicott, Washington Post, 18 Oct. 2019 Nothing in America’s tepid 19th-century contributions to European classical music adumbrated it; nor did the homely and sometimes hokey popular songs of Stephen Foster. — Heather Mac Donald, National Review, 22 Aug. 2019
Recent Examples of Synonyms for adumbrate
  1. foreshadow
  2. anticipate
  3. prefigure
  4. predict
  5. imply
  6. herald
  7. foresee
Verb
  • When a doddering Joe Biden threatened the party’s hold on the White House and foreshadowed a 2024 congressional wipeout, Pelosi used her considerable influence to not so gently ease the president aside as Democrats’ nominee for the White House.
    — Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles Times, 21 Oct. 2026
  • The demand letter may foreshadow new legal filings in the ongoing lawsuit by CNN, MS NOW and Politico.
    — Brian Stelter, CNN Money, 20 Oct. 2026
Definition of foreshadow
Verb
  • Eventually, an edict from the top came that existing attorneys should not anticipate additions to the court teams, according to one source.
    — Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 24 Oct. 2026
  • That signal can be aggregated, correlated, and exploited by hostile foreign intelligence services to anticipate our movements, targets, and timing.
    — Jon Brodkin, ArsTechnica, 23 Oct. 2026
Definition of anticipate
Verb
  • On the city’s West Side, the site of storied clubs such as Silvio’s as well as the Maxwell Street Market, blues musicians developed a style of electric blues in the 1950s that typically included a horn section (prefiguring soul music).
    — René Ostberg, Encyclopedia Britannica, 29 July 2026
  • Other Black families tried to hold on under the new regime but ultimately found Wilmington untenable and moved north, joining a local exodus that prefigured the Great Migration.
    — Lauren Collins, New Yorker, 3 July 2026
Definition of prefigure
Verb
  • Forecasters are predicting that the northeast and Mid-Atlantic will experience similar amounts of flooding as happened during a 2023 El Niño event — a record setting year.
    — Ava Berger, NPR, 29 Oct. 2026
  • The conjecture predicts that for the curve xa = yb, a count of the matrix solutions will always collapse into a Rogers-Ramanujan-type identity.
    — Lyndie Chiou, Scientific American, 29 Oct. 2026
Definition of predict
Verb
  • A lot of these orderly compositions soon give off the impression of a cage — if Mari Kusu’s performance as Takeshi’s mother, bristling with frustration, didn’t already imply as much.
    — Kambole Campbell, Variety, 3 Nov. 2026
  • Indoor/outdoor doormats, as their name implies, have flexible-use designs.
    — BestReviews, Chicago Tribune, 3 Nov. 2026
Definition of imply
Verb
  • While past anniversary shows have heralded iO alumni who made the jump from stage to screen, IO45 will be shining a light on the performers who keep the comedy going nightly on Kingsbury Street.
    — Ryan P. C. Trimble, Chicago Tribune, 30 Oct. 2026
  • In 2000, Stewart was cast as popular Marvel comic-book character Professor Xavier in X-Men, one of the flagship superhero movies that heralded the modern-day craze.
    — Emily Zemler, Rolling Stone, 29 Oct. 2026
Definition of herald
Verb
  • The framers did not foresee the manipulation of maps to intentionally split Americans and their representatives into two disparate political identities.
    — Dan Lipinski, Baltimore Sun, 27 Oct. 2026
  • However, Lovins and his contemporaries failed to foresee the drilling advances that have kept oil and gas dominant.
    — Daniel Cohan, The Conversation, 26 Oct. 2026
Definition of foresee

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Cite this Entry

“Adumbrate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/adumbrate. Accessed 5 Nov. 2026.

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