Wiktionary

after

See also: After, after-, and æfter

English

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Etymology

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From Middle English after, from Old English æfter, from Proto-West Germanic *aftar, from Proto-Germanic *after, *aftiri, from Proto-Indo-European *h₂epoteros (“further behind, further away”), from *h₂epo (“off, away”).

Cognate with Scots efter (“after”), North Frisian efter (“after, behind”), West Frisian after, achter, efter (“behind; after”), Low German/Dutch achter (“behind”), German after- (“after-”), Swedish/Danish efter (“after”), Norwegian Nynorsk/Norwegian Bokmål etter (“after”), Icelandic eftir (“after”), aftur (“back, again”).

The Irish usage to indicate recent completion of an activity is a calque of the Irish collocation Táim tar éis... (“I have just...”, literally “I am after...”).

Pronunciation

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Adverb

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after (not comparable)

  1. Behind; later in time; following.
    I left the room, and the dog bounded after.
    They lived happily ever after.
    I might come next month, or the month after.

Derived terms

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terms derived from after (adverb)

Translations

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Preposition

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after

  1. Subsequently to; following in time; later than.
    We had a few beers after the game.
    The time is a quarter after eight. (chiefly US)
    The Cold War began shortly after WWII.
    After you with the salt and pepper.
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
      I was about to say that I had known the Celebrity from the time he wore kilts. But I see I will have to amend that, because he was not a celebrity then, nor, indeed, did he achieve fame until some time after I left New York for the West.
    • 2012 April 15, Phil McNulty, “Tottenham 1-5 Chelsea”, in BBC:
      After early sparring, Spurs started to take control as the interval approached and twice came close to taking the lead. Terry blocked Rafael van der Vaart's header on the line and the same player saw his cross strike the post after Adebayor was unable to apply a touch.
    • 2013 June 8, “The new masters and commanders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 52:
      From the ground, Colombo’s port does not look like much. Those entering it are greeted by wire fences, walls dating back to colonial times and security posts. For mariners leaving the port after lonely nights on the high seas, the delights of the B52 Night Club and Stallion Pub lie a stumble away.
    1. Subsequently to and as a result of.
      After your bad behaviour, you will be punished.
    2. Subsequently to and considering.
      I’m not putting you in charge again after the last disaster.
    3. Subsequently to and in spite of.
      After all that has happened, he is still my friend.
      I can’t believe that, after all our advice against gambling, you walked into that casino!
    4. (often with verbs related to cleaning or tidying) Subsequently to the actions of (someone), in order to remedy a situation.
      I'm tired of picking up after you. Why can't you clean your own messes?
    5. (in reduplicative expressions) Repeatedly, seemingly in a sequence without end.
      day after day, time after time, mile after mile, beer after beer, smile after smile
    6. (Ireland, Newfoundland, usually preceded by a form of be, followed by an -ing form of a verb) Used to indicate recent completion of an activity.
      I was after finishing my dinner when there was a knock on the door. [= I had just finished my dinner when ...]
      • 1875, Patrick Kennedy, Evenings in the Duffrey, page 283:
        He was after walking on the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday before, all the way from the County Limerick, where his brother, Father John, has a parish; and you may believe, the poor man was tired
      • 1906, Lady Gregory, “A Miracle Play”, in The Shanachie, volume 1:
        Mother: Let him get away out of this now, himself and his share of songs. Look at the way he has your bib destroyed that I was after washing in the morning!
      • 2004, Joseph O'Connor, Star of the Sea‎[1], page 40:
        When I woke up it was black-dark and the music was after stopping. I could taste the bread I was after eating in the dream, as sweet and luscious as any I ever knew
      • 2004, Tabor Evans, Longarm and the Great Milk Train Robbery:
        He asked directions to the dairy those milk cans had shown up late at. Corrigan pointed back the way he'd come and explained, “You'd have been after riding past their loading platform because they don't have their sign overlooking where the train would be after stopping.
      • 2008, M. P. Shiel, The Black Box, page 45:
        "Yes. And where were you when the flood broke loose?" / "I would be most of the way to the Old House then. O'Loughlin was after running in wild to tell me he was hearing the Banshee out at The Old House, […] ."
  2. Behind.
    He will leave a trail of destruction after him.
    I told her to shut the door after her.
  3. In pursuit of, seeking.
    He’s after a job; run after him; inquire after her health.
  4. In allusion to, in imitation of; following or referencing.
    We named him after his grandfather.
    This painting is after Leonardo da Vinci.
    • 1735, The Sportsman's Dictionary:
      Work your horse in a calade, after the Italian way; ride him straight, and then you make good use of the calade.
  5. Below, often next below, in importance or rank.
    The princess is next in line to the throne after the prince.
  6. Denoting the aim or object; concerning; in relation to.
    to look after workmen; to enquire after a friend; to thirst after righteousness
  7. (obsolete) According to (an author or text).
  8. (obsolete) According to the direction and influence of; in proportion to; befitting.
    • a. 1627 (date written), Francis [Bacon], “Considerations Touching a VVarre vvith Spaine. […]”, in William Rawley, editor, Certaine Miscellany VVorks of the Right Honourable Francis Lo. Verulam, Viscount S. Alban. […], London: […] I. Hauiland for Humphrey Robinson, […], published 1629, →OCLC:
      He takes greatness of kingdoms according to bulk and currency, and not after their intrinsic value.

Synonyms

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Derived terms

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Expressions with "after"
Phrasal verbs with "after"

Translations

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The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Translations to be checked

Conjunction

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after

  1. Signifies that the action of the clause it starts takes place before the action of the other clause.
    The show ends after the fat lady sings.
    After we had decided to call it a day, I went home.
    • 1915, G[eorge] A. Birmingham [pseudonym; James Owen Hannay], chapter I, in Gossamer, New York, N.Y.: George H. Doran Company, →OCLC:
      It is never possible to settle down to the ordinary routine of life at sea until the screw begins to revolve. There is an hour or two, after the passengers have embarked, which is disquieting and fussy.
    • 1991, Donald "Shadow" Rimgale (character), Robert DeNiro (actor), Backdraft
      So you punched out a window for ventilation. Was that before or after you noticed you were standing in a lake of gasoline?
    • 2013 May-June, David Van Tassel, Lee DeHaan, “Wild Plants to the Rescue”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 3:
      Plant breeding is always a numbers game. […] The wild species we use are rich in genetic variation, […]. In addition, we are looking for rare alleles, so the more plants we try, the better. These rarities may be new mutations, or they can be existing ones that are neutral—or are even selected against—in a wild population. A good example is mutations that disrupt seed dispersal, leaving the seeds on the heads long after they are ripe.

Translations

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Adjective

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after

  1. (dated) Later; second (of two); next, following, subsequent
    • 1834, David Crockett, A Narrative of the Life of, Nebraska, published 1987, page 72:
      I did verily believe in my own mind, that I couldn't fight in that way at all; but my after experience convinced me that this was all a notion.
    • 1886, Thomas Hardy, The Mayor of Casterbridge:
      The amends he had made in after life were lost sight of in the dramatic glare of the original act.
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:
      In the old days, […] he gave no evidences of genius whatsoever. He never read me any of his manuscripts, […] and therefore my lack of detection of his promise may in some degree be pardoned. But he had then none of the oddities and mannerisms which I hold to be inseparable from genius, and which struck my attention in after days when I came in contact with the Celebrity.
  2. (nautical or aeronautical, where the frame of reference is within the craft) At or towards the stern of a ship or the rear of an aircraft.
    The after gun is mounted aft.
    The after gun is abaft the forward gun.
    The aircraft provided an after cabin for two radar operators.
    • 1952, C. S. Lewis, The Voyage of the Dawn Treader:
      Caspian led them down a ladder into the after hatch.

Usage notes

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  • As shown in the examples above, the adverb in this nautical usage is aft and the related preposition is abaft.

Derived terms

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Noun

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after (plural afters)

  1. Of before-and-after images: the one that shows the difference after a specified treatment.
    Coordinate term: before
    • 1987, Joanna Z. Adams, Makeovers, London: Headline Book Publishing Plc, →ISBN, page 61:
      In the ‘before’ shots, she’ll look like an ordinary suburban housewife; but we know she acts in community theater musicals sometimes, so the ‘afters’ will give her a glamorous starlet image, starting with a very revealing bathing suit shot.
    • 1998, Alan Gaynor, “How to Choose a Doctor”, in Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Cosmetic Surgery But Couldn’t Afford to Ask: A Complete Look at the Latest Techniques and Why They Are Safer and Less Expensive, by One of Today’s Most Prominent Cosmetic Surgeons, New York, N.Y.: Broadway Books, →ISBN, part I (The New Aesthetic Surgery), page 66:
      Did any of the before pictures remind you of yourself, and did any of the afters show what you hoped your results might be?
    • 2012, Sherry Petersik, John Petersik, Young House Love: 243 Ways to Paint, Craft, Update & Show Your Home Some Love, New York, N.Y.: Artisan, →ISBN, page 16, column 2:
      So with that in mind, we thought it might be helpful to put some pictures where our mouths are, and include some less-than-flattering photos of our first house after we’d lived there eight whole months. Spoiler alert: We were miiiles away from the “afters” that we shared on pages 6 and 7.
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References

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  • Hall, Joseph Sargent (1942 March 2) “3. The Consonants”, in The Phonetics of Great Smoky Mountain Speech (American Speech: Reprints and Monographs; 4), New York: King's Crown Press, →DOI, →ISBN, § 2, page 88.
  • Andrea Tyler and Vyvyan Evans, "Spatial particles of orientation", in The Semantics of English Prepositions: Spatial Scenes, Embodied Meaning and Cognition, Cambridge University Press, 2003, 0-521-81430 8
  • “after”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

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German

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Etymology

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From Middle High German after, from Old High German after.

Preposition

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after [with dative]

  1. (chiefly Early New High German) after
    • 1853, Gustav Eduard Benseler, Geschichte Freibergs und seines Bergbaues. Erste Abtheilung, Freiberg, page 251:
      Nun fragte der Forderer weiter an: wer irgend einen von ihnen after dem Tage hause oder hofe, d. h. zu Hause oder Hofe beherberge, wie der ihm zu Rechte bestanden sein. [...] Auf die fernere Frage des Forderers: ob er ihrer einen after dem Tage ansichtig werde, wie oder mit wem er sie aufhalten sollte, erklärte man ihm […]
      (please add an English translation of this quotation)

Middle Dutch

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Preposition

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after

  1. (Holland) Alternative form of achter

Adverb

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after

  1. (Holland) Alternative form of achter

Middle High German

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Etymology

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Inherited from Old High German after, from Proto-West Germanic *aftar.

Preposition

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after (+ dative)

  1. after

Descendants

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  • German: after; After
  • Luxembourgish: uechter (“throughout”)

Old High German

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Alternative forms

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Etymology

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Inherited from Proto-West Germanic *aftar, from Proto-Germanic *after, whence also Old English æfter, Old Norse aptr. Ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *h₂epótero- (“further behind, further away”), comparative form of *apo- (“off, behind”).

Pronunciation

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Preposition

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after (+ dative)

  1. after
    after zweim tagon
    after two days
  2. according to, in
    after antreitu
    in order

Adverb

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after

  1. behind
  2. after
  3. back

Descendants

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References

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  • Joseph Wright, An Old High German Primer

Polish

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Etymology

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Pseudo-anglicism, derived from after-party.

Pronunciation

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Noun

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after m inan

  1. (slang) after-party
    Synonyms: afterek, afterka, afterparty
    Antonyms: bifor, biforek, biforka

Declension

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Declension of after
singular plural
nominative after aftery
genitive afteru afterów
dative afterowi afterom
accusative after aftery
instrumental afterem afterami
locative afterze afterach
vocative afterze aftery

Derived terms

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nouns
verb
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noun

Further reading

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  • after in Polish dictionaries at PWN
  • after at Obserwatorium językowe Uniwersytetu Warszawskiego

Portuguese

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Etymology

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Unadapted borrowing from English after[-party].

Pronunciation

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Noun

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after m (plural afters)

  1. (informal) after-party
  2. (informal) late-night bar

Proto-Norse

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Romanization

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after

  1. Romanization of ᚨᚠᛏᛖᚱ

Scots

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Pronunciation

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Etymology 1

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Adjective

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after

  1. comparative degree of aft

Etymology 2

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Adverb

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after (comparative aftener, superlative aftenest)

  1. often, frequently

References

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Spanish

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  This entry needs quotations to illustrate usage. If you come across any interesting, durably archived quotes then please add them!

Etymology

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Borrowed from English after[-party].

Pronunciation

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  • IPA(key): /ˈafteɾ/ [ˈaf.t̪eɾ]
  • Rhymes: -afteɾ
  • Syllabification: af‧ter

Noun

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after m (plural afters)

  1. after-party
  2. late-night bar

West Frisian

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Preposition

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after

  1. Alternative form of achter
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