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Hitherto vs Unprecedented - What's the difference?

hitherto | unprecedented |

As an adverb hitherto

is (formal|or|legal) up to this or that time .

As an adjective unprecedented is

never before seen or done, without precedent.

hitherto

English

Adverb

(-)
  • (formal, or, legal) Up to this or that time.
  • * 1830 , Anna Maria Porter, The Barony (volume 3, page 460)
    • The exhaustless conjecturings of that evening's full conversation, made such of the small party, as had hitherto been strangers, well acquainted with each other's turn of mind

    Related terms

    * heretofore * thitherto

    unprecedented

    English

    Adjective

    (-)
  • Never before seen or done, without precedent.
  • * {{quote-news
    • , year=2011 , date=December 19 , author=Kerry Brown , title=Kim Jong-il obituary , work=The Guardian citation , page= , passage=With the descent of the cold war, relations between the two countries (for this is, to all intents and purposes, what they became after the end of the war) were almost completely broken off, with whole families split for the ensuing decades, some for ever. This event and its after-effects, along with the war against the Japanese in the 1940s, was to cast a long shadow over the years ahead, and led to the creation of the wholly unprecedented worship of Kim Il-sung, and his elevation to almost God-like status. It was also to create the system in which his son was to occupy almost as impossibly elevated a position.}}