Other forms: portended, portends, portending
To portend is to be a sign that something is coming. Portend disaster, what does it portend, portending trouble.
It is nearly always about something bad and belongs to omens and to grave writing about the future. The Latin means to stretch forward, from the same root as tend and extend.
1verbportendTo be a sign that something is coming.
“The dark clouds over the hills portend a heavy storm tonight.”
portend is a foretelling.
Latin portendere means to foretell, from por-, forward, plus tendere, to stretch.
Proto-Indo-European
*per-
Latin
portendere — to foretell
English, today
portend
Built from
Borrowed from Latin portendere (“to foretell”), from por- (“forward”) + tendo (“to stretch”).
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA