Forefront

[f. FORE- pref. + FRONT.]

  1.  The principal face or foremost part of anything (esp. of a building). Now rare. (In early use opposed to † back front.)

c. 1470.  Henry, Wallace, IX. 831.

1548.  Hall, Chron. (1809), 639. The forefrontes of euery gallery were hanged with white & grene Sarcenet wrethed and with great knottes of golde.

1551.  Robinson, trans. More’s Utop., II. G v b. The forefrontes or frontiers of the ij corners [of the Ilande], what wythe fordys & shelues, & what with rockes be very ieoperdous and daungerous.

1659.  Evelyn, To R. Boyle, 3 Sept. To the entry fore front of this a court, and at the other back front a plot walled in of a competent square, for the common seraglio, disposed into a garden.

1664.  Power, Experimental Philosophy, I. 12. These eyes are placed all in the forefront of their [Spiders’] head (which is round, and without any neck) all diaphanous and transparent, like a Locket of Diamonds, or a Sett of round Crystal-Beads.

1671.  Charente, Lett. Customs, 53. The … forefronts of the Houses are very little handsomer than those of our Country Villages.

1698.  Vanbrugh, Prov. Wife, III. iii. I love to sit in the Fore-front of a Box; for, if one sits behind, there’s two Acts gone perhaps before one’s found out.

1726.  Leoni, trans. Alberti’s Archit., I. 39/2. From the Middle of the Fore-front of the Work, I draw a Line quite thro’ to the Back-front.

1866.  G. Macdonald, Ann. Q. Neighb., ii. (1878), 19. Now this little gallery was something larger than was just necessary for the organ and its ministrants, and a few of the parishioners had chosen to sit in its fore-front.

1876.  Whitby Gloss., Foore-front, the face of the building.

  b.  The ‘front’ of an army, the front rank.

1513.  Douglas, Æneis, XI. ix. 12.

1631.  Quarles, Samson, Div. Poems (1717), 302.

1737.  Whiston, Josephus’ Hist., I. iv. § 7. When he fell, for he was in the fore-front, in the utmost danger in rallying his troops, they all gave ground, and the greatest part of his army were destroyed, either in the action or the flight.

1864.  Kingsley, Rom. & Teut., v. (1875), 130. To save Albinus, and the senate, he thrust himself into the fore-front of the battle, and fell at least like a brave man.

  c.  fig. (Now the most frequent use.)

1580.  Nashe, in Greene’s Menaphon (Arb.), 10. In the forefront of whom [i.e., men of import], I cannot but place that aged Father Erasmus, that inuested most of our Greeke Writers, in the roabes of the auncient Romaines.

1607.  Day, Trav. Eng. Bro., G iv b.

1846.  Trench, Mirac., Introd. (1862), 49. The position which it has won in the very forefront of the world is itself its vindication.

1874.  Green, Short Hist., iv. § 3. 176. To his [Edward’s] trust in them [his people] we owe our parliament, to his care for them the great statutes which stand in the forefront of our laws.

  2.  The beginning, commencement (of a book, document, or literary work). Obs. or arch.

1577–87.  Holinshed, Chron., II. 40/1. Iohannes Duns Scotus an Irishman borne, as in the forefront of this treatise I haue declared.

1612.  T. Taylor, Comm. Titus, iii. 8. The Author of it is set in the forefront or face of it.

1870.  Spurgeon, Treas. Dav., Ps. l. 1. To render the address the more impressive, these august titles are mentioned, just as in royal decrees the names and dignities of monarchs are placed in the forefront.

  3.  The front of the body as opposed to the ‘back.’

1880.  Browning, Dram. Idylls, Ser. II. Muléykeh, 34.

1894.  Crockett, Raiders, vii. 55. I was to do nothing except lie thus prone on my fore-front, with my nose cocking out of the heather, and keep a watch till Silver Sand came back.

  Hence Forefront v. trans., to build a (new) forefront to.

1761.  Sterne, Tr. Shandy, IV. xxxi. He would new forefront his house, and add a new wing to make it even.