Harbinger

ˈhɑːrbɪndʒər

noun

a person or thing that announces or signals the approach of another

The word 'harbinger' is derived from Middle English 'herbengar,' which ultimately comes from the Old French word 'herbergier,' meaning 'to provide lodging' or 'to host.' Over time, its meaning evolved to refer to something that heralds or foretells what is to come.

He’d seen the harbinger that had come to Maester Aemon with word of summer’s end, the great raven of the Citadel, white and silent as Ghost.

George R. R. Martin

A Clash of Kings

A great potentate might arise, an artful prodigy, who with approval and disapproval could strain and constrain all the past, until it became for him a bridge, a harbinger, a herald, and a cock-crowing.

Friedrich Nietzsche

Thus Spake Zarathustra

And, lo, wonder of metempsychosis, it is she, the everlasting bride, harbinger of the daystar, the bride, ever virgin.

James Joyce

Ulysses

They were shouting to Ali ibn el Hussein “God give victory to our Sherif” and were reining back on their haunches beside me with “Welcome, Aurans, harbinger of action.” So he climbed up his mare, into her high Moorish saddle, and with his seven Algerian servants behind him in stiff file, began to prance delicately in slow curves, crying out “Houp, Houp,” in his throaty voice, and firing a pistol unsteadily in the air.

T. E. Lawrence

Seven Pillars of Wisdom

M’smow, the foul odor of a summer night, was the harbinger of death at the hands of demons.

Frank Herbert

Children of Dune

He comes as a harbinger.

Martin, George, R. R.

A Dance With Dragons

I now must change Those notes to tragic; foul distrust and breach Disloyal on the part of man, revolt And disobedience; on the part of Heaven, Now alienated, distance and distaste, Anger and just rebuke, and judgment given, That brought into this World a world of woe, Sin and her shadow Death, and Misery, Death’s harbinger.

John Milton

Paradise Lost