HERALD • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Herald

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/hˈɛrəld/ Listen

noun

Herald n.

1.

(Antiq.) An officer whose business was to denounce or proclaim war, to challenge to battle, to proclaim peace, and to bear messages from the commander of an army. He was invested with a sacred and inviolable character.

2.

In the Middle Ages, the officer charged with the above duties, and also with the care of genealogies, of the rights and privileges of noble families, and especially of armorial bearings. In modern times, some vestiges of this office remain, especially in England. See Heralds' College (below), and King-at-Arms.

3.

A proclaimer; one who, or that which, publishes or announces; as, the herald of another's fame.

4.

A forerunner; a a precursor; a harbinger. "It was the lark, the herald of the morn."

5.

Any messenger. "My herald is returned."

Heralds' College, in England, an ancient corporation, dependent upon the crown, instituted or perhaps recognized by Richard III. in 1483, consisting of the three Kings-at-Arms and the Chester, Lancaster, Richmond, Somerset, Windsor, and York Heralds, together with the Earl Marshal. This retains from the Middle Ages the charge of the armorial bearings of persons privileged to bear them, as well as of genealogies and kindred subjects; called also College of Arms.

verb

Herald v. t. (past & past part. heralded; pres. part. heralding) To introduce, or give tidings of, as by a herald; to proclaim; to announce; to foretell; to usher in.

See images of 'Herald'

Etymology of 'Herald'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Herald" Quotes from Famous Books

... "American Minerva," which subsequently became the "New York Commercial Advertiser." In conducting the paper he introduced an economical device, which was novel at the time, but has since become an established mode with daily newspapers: he issued a semi-weekly paper, called the "Herald," which was made up from the columns of the daily "Minerva" without recomposition ...

— Noah Webster - American Men of Letters • Horace E. Scudder

... the rear of this range that Count Strzelecki and his companions, on their way to Western Port, experienced the sufferings related in the Port Phillip Herald, June 1840, from which I extract the following: "The party was now in a most deplorable condition. Messrs. MacArthur and Riley and their attendants had become so exhausted as to be unable to cope with the difficulties which beset their progress. The Count, being more inured ...

— Discoveries in Australia, Volume 2 • John Lort Stokes

... a Joint Agricultural Consultative Committee was established, with the U.S. represented entirely by the private sector. This could herald a new role for the American private sector in helping solve the world's serious food shortages. I am pleased to say that our relations with Nigeria are at an all-time high, providing the foundation for an even stronger relationship in ...

— State of the Union Addresses of Jimmy Carter • Jimmy Carter

... remained young and handsome. The vigor of her youth had overcome the grief of her spirit, and her cheeks, although colorless and transparent in their paleness, were still free from that sallow, sickly pallor, which is the herald of approaching dissolution. She was apparently healthy and young, and only sick and cold at heart. Perhaps she only needed some sunbeams to warm up again her chilled heart, only some gleam of hope to make her soul young again, and strong and ready once more to love and to suffer. ...

— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach

... New York, that is one merit of the place. But if everything else fails, we can come back to this. I want you to take the refusal of it, Basil. And we'll commence looking this very evening as soon as we've had dinner. I cut a lot of things out of the Herald as we came on. ...

— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

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