| 释义 |
forefront|ˈfɔəfrʌnt|
[f. fore- prefix + front.]
1. The principal face or foremost part of anything (esp. of a building). Now rare. (In early use opposed to † back front.)
c1470Henry Wallace ix. 831 He gert thaim tak Syllys off ayk, and a stark barres mak, At a foyr frount, fast in the forest syd. 1548Hall Chron. (1809) 639 The fore⁓frontes of euery gallery were hanged with..Sarcenet. 1551Robinson tr. More's Utop. ii. G v b, The forefrontes or frontiers of the ij corners [of the Ilande], what wythe fordys & shelues, & what with rockes be very..daungerous. 1659Evelyn To R. Boyle 3 Sept., To the entry fore front of this a court, and at the other back front a plot walled in of a competent square. 1664Power Micros. Observ. in Sir T. Blount Nat. Hist. (1693) 314 These Eyes are plac'd all in the forefront of their [Spiders'] Head. 1671Charente Let. Customs 53 The..forefronts of the Houses are very little handsomer than those of our Country Villages. 1698Vanburgh Prov. Wife iii. iii, I love to sit in the fore⁓front of a box; for, if one sits behind, there's two Acts gone before one's found out. 1726Leoni Alberti's Archit. I. 39/2 From the..Fore-front of the Work I draw a Line quite thro' to the Back-front. 1866G. Macdonald Ann. Q. Neighb. ii. (1878) 19 This little gallery was..larger than was just necessary for the organ..and a few of the parishioners had chosen to sit in its fore-front. 1876Whitby Gloss., Foore-front, the face of the building.
b. The ‘front’ of an army, the front rank.
1513Douglas æneis xi. ix. 14 The Troiane barnage..With ordinance of Tuscan, that did spreid In forfront al the large feyldis on breid. 1631Quarles Samson Div. Poems (1717) 302 They brought him bound To the forefront of the Philistian Band. 1737Whiston Josephus' Hist. i. iv. §7 He was in the fore-front, in the utmost danger. 1864Kingsley Rom. & Teut. v. (1875) 130 He thrust himself into the fore-front of the battle.
c. fig. (Now the most frequent use.)
1589Nashe in Greene's Menaphon (Arb.) 10 In the fore⁓front of whom [i.e. men of import], I cannot but place that aged Father Erasmus. 1607Day Trav. Eng. Bro. G iv b, True constancie's my fore-front and my back. 1846Trench Mirac. Introd. (1862) 49 The position which it has won in the very forefront of the world. 1874Green Short Hist. iv. §3. 176 The great statutes which stand in the forefront of our laws.
2. The beginning, commencement (of a book, document, or literary work). Obs. or arch.
1577–87Holinshed Chron. II. 40/1 Iohannes Duns Scotus an Irishman borne, as in the forefront of this treatise I haue declared. 1612T. Taylor Comm. Titus iii. 8 The author of it is set in the forefront or face of it. 1870Spurgeon Treas. Dav. Ps. l. 1 In royal decrees the names and dignities of monarchs are placed in the forefront.
3. The front of the body as opposed to the ‘back’.
1880Browning Dram. Idylls Ser. ii. Mule'ykeh 34 Her forefront whitens indeed Like a yellowish wave's cream⁓crest..Her fetlock is foam-splashed too. 1894Crockett Raiders 74, I was to do nothing except lie thus prone on my forefront.
Hence ˈforefront v. trans., to build a (new) forefront to.
1761Sterne Tr. Shandy IV. xxxi, He would new fore⁓front his house, and add a new wing to make it even. |