yesteryear

English

Alternative forms

• yester-year

Etymology

Compound of yester- +‎ year. Coined by Rossetti, to translate Middle French antan (“last year”) (in Villon's Testament), from Vulgar Latin *anteannum (“the year before”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA: /ˈjɛstəjɪə/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

yesteryear (plural yesteryears)

1. (rare) Last year.
2. (poetic) Past years; time gone by; yore.
   • 1928, D. H. Lawrence, Lady Chatterley's Lover, ch. 5:

     Where are the snows of yesteryear?

Translations

last year

• Basque: iaz (eu)
• Czech: loni (cs)
• Danish: i fjor (da)
• Finnish: mennyt (fi) vuosi (fi)
• French: année passée, an passé, année dernière, an dernier
• Hungarian: tavaly (hu)

• Irish: anuraidh (ga)
• Persian: دیسال (fa) (disâl)
• Portuguese: ano passado (pt) m, antanho (pt) m
• Serbo-Croatian: lani (sh)
• Slovene: láni (sl)
• Swedish: i fjol (sv), i fjor (sv)

times gone by

• Catalan: antany (ca)
• Dutch: weleer (nl)
• Finnish: menneet (fi) vuodet (fi)

• French: jadis (fr), antan (fr)
• Spanish: antaño (es)
• Vietnamese: xưa (vi), thời xưa (vi), ngày xưa (vi)

See also

• yesterday
• bygone