​HYSTERON-PROTERON (Gr. ὕστερον, latter, and πρότερον, former), a figure of speech, in which the order of words or phrases is inverted, and that which should logically or naturally come last is put first, to secure emphasis for the principal idea; the classical example is Virgil’s “moriamur et in media arma ruamus,” “let us die and charge into the thick of the fight” (Aen. ii. 358). The term is also applied to any inversion in order of events, arguments, &c.