Other forms: bodes, boded
To bode is to be a sign of what is to come. Bode well, bode ill, it bodes badly.
It survives almost entirely in bodes well and bodes ill, and it is nearly always about the future rather than the present. The related forebode is stronger and always bad. Note boding and foreboding; and that bode is the same root as the old word bode meaning a messenger, which is what a sign is.
1verbbodeTo be a sign of what is to come.
“The dark clouds did not bode well for our picnic.”
bode is a foretelling.
Also accepted in games: betoken
To bode is to carry the message. Old English boda meant a herald or a prophet, from a root meaning to be awake or aware, so whatever bodes ill is bringing the news on ahead of the event.
Proto-Indo-European
*bʰewdʰ-
English, today
bode
The is derived partly from the following:
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA