backward

CEFRC1

/ˈbæk.wə(ɹ)d/

adjective

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

Examples

At a glance

Sits at C1 on the CEFR scale

Also pronounced

Deep Dive

Extra meanings

Situated toward or at the rear of something.
Acting or moving in the direction opposite to that in which someone or something is facing.
Acting or moving in the direction opposite to the usual direction of movement.

In context

The occasional apparent backward movement of planets is evidence that they revolve around the sun.
The silt collects in the backward part of the tank.
The dog walked backward.

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Question 1 · Quick check

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

The word in print, with each source given in full.

The fact that a child is backward in talking is no sign of defective intelligence, nor does it prove that it will be a slow pupil.
1910, Leonard Keene Hirshberg, What You Ought to Know about Your Baby, page 19
the Mind can backward caſt Upon herself, her understanding Light
1599, John Davies, Nosce Teipsum
It was still possible — perhaps it might be inevitable — for him to accept frankly the altered conditions, and avow Baldassarre's existence; but hardly without casting an unpleasant light backward on his original reticence[…]
1862, George Eliot, Romola
In the dark backward and abysm of time.
1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]
The effect is to retard their progress—giving them too little opportunity and too little incentive for copying the language of adults— and a little later the child is pained and the parents' ears tingle at hearing a chance remark: “ How terribly backward she is about talking."
1882, Charles Edward Page, How to feed the baby to make it healthy and happy, page 133

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From Middle English bakwarde, abakward, equivalent to back (adverb) + -ward. Cognate with Old Frisian bekward (“backward”).