Q: The Wall Street Journal recently cited speculation that Russia’s aggressive military recruitment “preludes another draft.” If I had written it, I would have used “presages.” Any thoughts?
A: Yes, we too would have used a verb like “presage” or “foreshadow” instead of “prelude,” which can mean to introduce or precede but lacks the ominous sense of the other words.
But it’s interesting that in the past, “prelude” did sometimes have a sense of foreboding, as did praeludere, the Latin source of the English verb.
In classical Latin, praeludere meant to compose a prelude or make a trial attempt, but in post-classical Latin, it could also mean to introduce or foreshadow, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.
When the word “prelude” first appeared in English in the 16th century, the OED says, it was a noun meaning “an introduction, a preface; a precursor.”
The dictionary’s earliest citation is from a 1548 English translation, edited by Nicholas Udall, of Erasmus’s Latin Paraphrases (retellings of the Gospels):
“They shall only be preludes [Latin præludia] of the ende yt is to come” (from the paraphrase of Mark 13, where Jesus predicts the destruction of the temple in Jerusalem and the end of the world).
When the verb “prelude” first appeared in English in the 17th century, the OED says, it meant “to form or act as a prelude, to be introductory to a subsequent work, action, event, etc.” The first Oxford example for the verb uses the gerund “preluding” in an Anglican theological polemic:
“The matter of your discourse being of Gods infinite wisedome, and to that purpose preluding of the imperfect wisedom of man” (from Discovery of D. Iacksons Vanitie, 1631, by William Twisse). In the polemic, the Calvinist Twisse attacks the writings of the anti-Calvinist Dr. Thomas Jackson.
The verb soon took on the sense of to foreshadow, according to the OED. In the dictionary’s first example, the Welsh poet Henry Vaughan uses it in a metaphor for human mortality:
“The Sun now stoops, and hasts his beams to hide Under the dark, and melancholy Earth. All but preludes thy End” (from “Rules and Lessons,” a poem in Silex Scintillans, or Sacred Poems and Private Ejaculations, 1650). In Latin, silex scintillans means “sparkling flint.”
However, standard dictionaries now generally list these senses for the verb “prelude”: (1) to be an introduction or precedent; (2) to introduce or precede, (3) to play a musical prelude. Here’s an example from a report on Fox News about the opening of the recent World Cup competition (Jun. 12, 2026):
“After the numerous opening performances that preluded the start of the 2026 World Cup inside the iconic, colorful and majestic Mexico City Stadium, Mexico finally kickstarted the tournament with a joyous and confident victory.”
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