fordo

English

Alternative forms

• foredo

Etymology

From Middle English fordon, from Old English fordōn (“to undo, bring to naught, ruin, destroy, abolish, kill, corrupt, seduce, defile”), from Proto-Germanic *fardōną, *fradōną (“to ruin, destroy”), equivalent to for- +‎ do. Cognate with Dutch verdoen (“to kill, waste”), German vertun (“to waste, spend, consume”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA: /fɔːˈduː/

Verb

fordo (third-person singular simple present fordoes, present participle fordoing, simple past fordid, past participle fordone)

1. (obsolete) To kill, destroy.
   • 1602, William Shakespeare, Hamlet , act V scene 1:

     [...] This doth betoken / The corpse they follow did with desperate hand / Fordo it own life.

2. (obsolete) To annul, abolish, cancel.
   • 1485, Sir Thomas Malory, Le Morte Darthur, Book IV:

     Me forthynketh said kynge Pellinore that this shalle me betyde but god may fordoo wel desteny.

3. (archaic) To do away with, undo; to ruin
4. (archaic) To overcome with fatigue; to exhaust.
   • 1874, James Thomson, The City of Dreadful Night

     worn faces (...)

     they wander, wander,

     Or sit foredone and desolately ponder

     Through sleepless hours with heavy drooping head.

Quotations

• For usage examples of this term, see the citations page.

Anagrams

• Frodo