0 past simple and past participle of portend
1 to be a sign that something bad is likely to happen in the future:
It was a deeply superstitious country, where earthquakes were commonly believed to portend the end of dynasties.
It is important to capture in some detail the full import of this failure and the tragedy it portended.
The reality is the situation as it exists and as it is portended in certain towns, cities and areas.
Unless there is a more robust, credible and fully explained regulatory impact assessment, the concern must be that eventual costs will substantially outstrip those currently portended.
The glassy sea, humid atmosphere, and falling barometer portended the approaching engagement between ship and her relentlessly violent foes, sea and wind.
Court astrologers, however, were also correct that the event portended disaster.
These compositions aroused the interest of the specialists who found them excellent writing which portended a brilliant future for the composer.
The dream had greatly disturbed him, and he now confessed to the thought that it had portended the death of one of us.
In retrospect, the joke is considered witty and yet eerily prescient because it portended some of the future turmoil that the artist would endure.
