Aforegoing

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. preceding in sequence or time, referencing content that has already been introduced or described in prior discussion
2. indicative of something mentioned previously, establishing a direct connection to earlier information provided in context
3. relating to matters mentioned earlier, denoting the content that has been stated before or referenced in preceding text

Etymology: "Aforegoing" is built from "afore," an old English word meaning "before" in time, place, or order, and "going," the present participle of "go." Put together, the sense is something like "going before," which is how the word still works today: it points back to what has already been said in the text. The first part, "afore," survives mainly in legal and formal writing and in older dialects, where it has long been used as a more formal alternative to "before." The second part is the ordinary verb "go," so the compound needs no special knowledge to decode once you see that "afore" points backward.

Synonyms: previous, preceding

Antonyms: following, subsequent