Wednesday 24th August 2016
Presentiment /prɪˈzɛntɪmənt/
Noun
1. a sense of something about to happen; premonition
Quote
... the good lady set that question entirely at rest, by informing them that she had
a presentiment on the subject--a species of second-sight with which she had
been in the habit of clinching every argument with the deceased Mr Nickleby, and in
nine cases and three-quarters out of every ten, determining it the wrong way.
Charles Dickens, The Life and Adventures of Nicholas Nickleby 1839
Origin
Presentiment is a loanword from French, stemming from the obsolete verb
pressentir meaning "to sense beforehand." It entered English in the late 1600’s.
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