yesteryear

See also: yester-year

English

Alternative forms

• yester-year

Etymology

Compound of yester- +‎ year. Coined by Dante Gabriel Rossetti, to translate Middle French antan (“last year”) (in Ballad 1 of François Villon's Testament), from Vulgar Latin *anteannum (“the year before”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈjɛstəjɪə/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Noun

yesteryear (plural yesteryears)

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

     Where are the snows of yesteryear?

Translations

times gone by

• Catalan: antany
• Dutch: weleer (nl) n, voorbije (nl) n, verleden (nl) n
• Finnish: menneet (fi) vuodet (fi)
• French: jadis (fr), antan (fr)
• German: einst (de)
• Greek: κάποτε (el) n (kápote)

• Ido: olim (io)
• Italian: passato (it) m
• Maori: raurangi
• Spanish: antaño (es)
• Vietnamese: xưa (vi), thời xưa (vi), ngày xưa (vi)
• Welsh: llynedd f

last year

• Armenian: հերու (hy) (heru)

  Old Armenian: հերու (heru)

• Basque: iaz (eu)
• Bulgarian: лани (bg) (lani)
• Catalan: antany m
• Czech: loni (cs)
• Danish: i fjor
• Dutch: gisterjaar n
• Faroese: í fjør
• Finnish: mennyt vuosi
• French: année passée, an passé, année dernière, an dernier
• German: Vorjahr (de) n
• Greek: πέρυσι (el) n (pérysi)

  Ancient: πέρυσι (pérusi)

• Hebrew: אשתקד‎‎ (he) (eshtakád)
• Hungarian: tavaly (hu)
• Icelandic: í fyrra
• Irish: anuraidh
• Italian: anno (it) scorso (it)

• Japanese: 去年 (ja) (Kyonen)
• Korean: 작년 (ko) (jangnyeon)
• Latvian: pērn, pērngad
• Low German:

  German Low German: Vörjohr n

• Maori: tauhouanga, tauhounga
• Middle High German: vert
• Norwegian: i fjor
• Old Norse: fjǫrð
• Old Swedish: fiordh
• Persian: دیسال‎‎ (disâl)
• Portuguese: ano passado m, antanho (pt) m
• Russian: в прошлом году (v prošlom godu)
• Sanskrit: परुत् (sa) (parut)
• Serbo-Croatian: lani (sh), лани
• Slovak: vlani
• Slovene: láni (sl)
• Spanish: antaño (es) m, año pasado m
• Swedish: i fjol (sv), i fjor (sv)
• Welsh: llynedd f

See also

• yesterday
• bygone