forearmed

1. 1
   adjectivefiguratively

   Equipped and prepared in advance to meet an anticipated threat, argument, or confrontation.

   Like a chess player who has studied an opponent's favorite openings before the match begins.

   Forearmed with the latest figures, the lawyers walked into the deposition unshaken.

   Knowing his rival's favorite feints, the champion stepped onto the mat forearmed.

   Similarprearmed

   Oppositeunprepared, unready

   Note

   A word that works both literally and figuratively. The preparation can be a fighter's, a lawyer's or a debater's, and the arms may be blows, documents or rebuttals. It is an absolute adjective: someone is forearmed or not, never more forearmed than someone else. Its synonym prearmed carries the same sense, and like forearmed it puts the weight on the timing, not on the weapons.

2. 2
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of forearm.

   He forearmed himself against criticism by rehearsing answers to every likely objection.

   The committee had forearmed itself with legal opinions before the contentious vote.

   Note

   Built from fore- and arm plus -ed, this past form behaves like armed. One spelling serves the simple past and, after have or be, the perfect and the passive. The verb is transitive, and it is sometimes figurative: what is armed in advance may be a mind or a case, not a body. The same spelling also names having a certain kind of forearm, which comes from the body-part noun instead.

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