harbinger

Etymology

Originally, a person that is sent in advance to arrange lodgings. From Middle English herberjour, herbergeour, from Old French herbergeor (French hébergeur), from Frankish *heriberga (“lodging, inn”, literally “army shelter”), from Proto-West Germanic *harjabergu (“army camp, shelter”). Compare German Herberge, Italian albergo, Dutch herberg, English harbor. More at here, borrow.

noun

1. A person or thing that foreshadows or foretells the coming of someone or something.
   harbinger of danger; harbinger of doom; harbinger of spring
   I knew by these harbingers who were coming. 1828, Walter Savage Landor, Imaginary Conversations, Lord Brooke and Sir Philip Sidney
   It’s to realize that Moon Frye, by cheerfully surveilling her own life, and those first Real Worlders, by agreeing to the constant presence of producers and cameras, were the harbingers of today’s culture, in which self-image is shaped in the expectation of a lens and personhood collates with brand identity. 2021-03-26, Alexis Soloski, “‘Kid 90’ and the Days When Even Wild TV Teens Had Privacy”, in The New York Times, →ISSN
2. (obsolete) One who provides lodgings; especially, the officer of the English royal household who formerly preceded the court when travelling, to provide and prepare lodgings.
   outward decency […] is the Harbinger to provide the lodging for inward holinesse 1644, Thomas Fuller, Truth Maintained (a sermon)

verb

1. (transitive) To announce or precede; to be a harbinger of.
   It was harbingered also by the terrible comet of January, which appeared in a cadent and obscure house, denoting sickness and death; […] 1841, William Harrison Ainsworth, chapter VIII, in Old Saint Paul's, published 1903, page 94