Contextualizebeta

erstwhile

adv
/ˈɜː(ɹ)st.waɪl/UK/ˈɝst.waɪl/US

Etymology

From erst (“first, formerly”) + while.

  1. derived from *kʷyeh₁-✻ — “to rest”
  2. inherited from *hwīlō✻
  3. inherited from *hwīlu✻
  4. inherited from hwīl
  5. inherited from whyle
  6. formed as erstwhile — “erst + while”

Definitions

  1. Formerly

    Formerly; in the past.

  2. Former, previous.

    • “Scarcely had Alice reached her twentieth birthday, than she gave her erstwhile fiancée^([sic]) his formal congé.[…]”
    • As an aftermath of the erstwhile competition between companies, 41 goods depots served the Liverpool and Birkenhead docks in 1923.

  3. Respected, honourable.

    • If you're for one of my erstwhile opponents, that's O.K. Just don't work too hard.

The neighborhood

Vish — recursive loop

No curated loop yet for erstwhile. Loops are being traced one word at a time while the ingestion pipeline matures.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA