long ago meaning: definition, quotations

long ago

advalso spelled long-ago

At a time in the past, especially the distant past.

3 more examples

Long ago, in a far country, there lived a queen who had three princes.
That concertina was a wonder in its way. The handles that was on it first was wore out long ago, and he'd made new ones of braided rope yarn. And the bellows was patched in more places than a cranberry picker's overalls.1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VIII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
Not long ago, it was difficult to produce photographs of tiny creatures with every part in focus. That’s because the lenses that are excellent at magnifying tiny subjects produce a narrow depth of field. A photo processing technique called focus stacking has changed that.2013 July-August, Catherine Clabby, “Focus on Everything”, in American Scientist, archived from the original on 11 May 2017:

Synonyms: long since, a long time ago, anciently, backcast, lang syne, long ago, long long ago, of old, of yore, once upon a time, stalely, time was, way back, way back when, yore
Antonyms: recently, eventually, one day
Hypernyms: formerly

adj

Existing in the relatively distant past.

The answer, according to James Moore, who as minister of Canadian heritage is in charge of the campaign, is that the government simply wants the long-ago war, which few Canadians know well, to be remembered.2012 October 7, Ian Austen, “Canada Puts Spotlight on War of 1812, With U.S. as Villain”, in New York Times:
Back in the long ago days of the 2000 season, the New England Patriots were a 5-11 mess of a team that finished in the cellar of the AFC East. It was an inauspicious start to the tenure of head coach Bill Belichick.2019 July 18, “B/R NFL Expert Picks for 2019 Division Winners”, in Bleacher Report:

noun

The distant past; the days of yore.

He cast his time into the long-ago, because already the long-ago had a special poetical attraction.1936, J. R. R. Tolkien, Beowulf: The Monsters and the Critics, Norwood, Pa.: Norwood Editions, published 1976, page 20:

Entry derived from the Wiktionary, under licence CC BY-SA 4.0 — authors: page histories for long ago and long-ago.