HERALD • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Herald

Add this Dictionary
to your website!
See more options...

/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

Share |

Add this dictionary
to your browser search bar

"Herald" Quotes from Famous Books

... gospel. We give the narrative of his trials and sufferings in the simple and affecting language of the missionaries, which excited such powerful interest in the bosoms of Christians, at the time of its first publication. The principal facts are taken from the Missionary Herald published by the American Board ...

— Fox's Book of Martyrs - Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant - Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs • John Fox

... last, with the silvery moon growing pale and the stars fading out. First a heavy grey, then a silvery light, then soft, roseate tints, followed by orange flecks far up in the east, and then one glorious, golden blaze to herald the sun, as the great orb slowly seemed to roll up over the edge of the plain, and bring with it life, and ...

— The Silver Canyon - A Tale of the Western Plains • George Manville Fenn

... on his yearly road Comes towards us, his great glory seems to me, As from the sky he pours it all abroad, A golden herald, my ...

— Poems • Frances Anne Butler

... Bhats who act as genealogists of the cultivating and other castes and accept cooked food from their clients may perhaps be held to rank with or even below them. But the high-class Bhats are undoubtedly derived from Brahmans and Rajputs, and rank just below those castes. The bard or herald had a sacred character, and his person was inviolable like that of the herald elsewhere, and this has given a special status to the whole caste. [46] The Kayasths are the writer caste of Hindustan, and the Karans ...

— The Tribes and Castes of the Central Provinces of India--Volume I (of IV) • R.V. Russell

... pain or death had wrung from him, the only boon he had asked; and none of us could grant it, for all the airs that blew were useless now. Dan flung up the window. The first red streak of dawn was warming the gray east, a herald of the coming sun. John saw it, and with the love of light which lingers in us to the end, seemed to read in it a sign of hope of help, for, over his whole face there broke that mysterious expression, brighter than any smile, which ...

— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott

Copyright © 2025 Dictionary One.com