Previously referred to a figure heard and acknowledged (14)
I believe the answer is:
aforementioned
'previously referred to' is the definition.
'heard and acknowledged' is the wordplay.
'heard' becomes 'afore' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'and' means one lot of letters go next to another.
'acknowledged' becomes 'mentioned' ('mention' can be a synonym of 'acknowledge').
'afore'+'mentioned'='AFOREMENTIONED'
'a figure' is the link.
This may not be correct. Some or all of it may be part of another bit of the clue.
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for aforementioned that I've seen before include "previously laid down" , "previously stated" , "previously cited" , "alluded to previously" .)