where are the snows of yesteryear

English

Etymology

Quotation from Dante Gabriel Rossetti's "Ballad of Dead Ladies," an 1869 translation of François Villon's poem "Ballade des dames du temps jadis" (1533)[1] (in the original, où sont les neiges d'antan?). The word yesteryear was coined by Rossetti.

Pronunciation
  • Audio (AU)(file)

Phrase

where are the snows of yesteryear?

  1. (rhetorical question, colloquial) Used to emphasize that life passes quickly.
    • 1918 [1915], Thomas Burke, Nights in London‎, New York: Henry Holt and Company:
      Pathetic as its passing is, one cannot honestly regret the old school. I was looking last night at the programme of my very first hall, and received a terrible shock to my time-sense. Where are the snows of yesteryear? Where are the entertainers of 1895?

References
  1. François Villon (1461) “Ballade des dames du temps jadis [Ballade of Ladies of Time Gone By]”, in Le Grand Testament (in French), published 1876: “Mais où sont les neiges d’antan ! ― Where is the snow of yesteryear?”
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