pre‧vi‧ous S1 W1 AC / priviəs / 形容词
1 [仅用于名词前] having happened or existed before the event, time, or thing that you are talking about now :
I’ve met him before on two previous occasions.
She has two children from a previous marriage.
Do you have any previous experience of this type of work?
The lawyer told the judge that Kennedy had no previous convictions.
2 the previous day/chapter/owner etc the one that came immediately before the one you are talking about now :
I had met them the previous day.
as we said in the previous chapter
The trees had been planted by the previous owner.
3 previous to something formal before a particular time or event :
There were almost no women MPs previous to 1945.
THESAURUS
previous [仅用于名词前] used when talking about a person, thing, time etc before the one that you are talking about now : The car’s previous owner didn’t take very good care of it. | Please ignore my previous instructions. | The temperature is higher than in previous years.
last [仅用于名词前] used when talking about the one that you had just before now, or the one that existed just before now : The last apartment we lived in was much smaller than this one. | Ben’s last girlfriend was a teacher. | Beth broke up with her last boyfriend because he drank too much.
old [仅用于名词前] used when talking about people you knew or things you had in the past, or about things that existed in the past and have been replaced by newer things : I never liked my old boss. | I saw Phil with one of my old girlfriends. | The new stadium is much bigger than the old one. | He was my old maths teacher.
preceding [仅用于名词前] formal coming just before the time or thing you have just mentioned, or before the part of a book where you are now : There were fewer crimes compared to the preceding year. | The author dealt with this subject in the preceding chapters of the book. | In the preceding section of the poem, Whitman is talking about how important it is to live in the present.
former [仅用于名词前] formal used to describe someone or something that used to have a particular job or position but does not any more : her former husband | the former US President | Kyoto was the former capital of Japan.
ex-wife/boyfriend/soldier etc someone who used to be someone’s wife, used to be a soldier etc, but is not any more : Her dad’s an ex-policeman. | Lydia is still friends with her ex-husband.
the one before the person or thing that existed before the one you have just mentioned : I didn’t enjoy Spielberg’s last film but I thought the one before was all right. | Each year, the convention is a little larger than the one before.