feint
Pronunciation Etymology 1
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Pronunciation Etymology 1
The noun is borrowed from French feinte, from feindre, from Old French feindre, faindre, from Latin fingere, the present active infinitive of fingō.
The verb is derived from the noun.
- Italian finta
- Occitan fencha, fenha
- osp finta (modern Spanish finta)
feint (plural feints)
- (often, military) A movement made to confuse an opponent; a dummy.
- 1683, William Temple, “Memoirs of what Pass’d in Christendom, from the War Begun 1672, to the Peace Concluded 1679. Chapter III.”, in The Works of Sir William Temple, […], volume I, London: […] J. Round, J[acob] Tonson, J. Clarke, B[enjamin] Motte, T. Wotton, S[amuel] Birt, and T[homas] Osborne, published 1731, →OCLC ↗, page 459 ↗:
- In October, Friburg had been taken by a Feint of the Duke of Crequi, before the Duke of Lorrain cou'd come to relieve it; […]
(boxing, fencing) A blow, thrust, or other offensive movement resembling an attack on some part of the body, intended to distract from a real attack on another part. - 1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], chapter XII, in Rob Roy. […], volume II, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC ↗, pages 251–252 ↗:
- He had some advantage in the difference of our weapons; for his sword, as I recollect, was longer than mine, […] His obvious malignity of purpose never for a moment threw him off his guard, and he exhausted every feint and strategem proper to the science of defence; while, at the same time, he mediated the most desperate catastrophe to our rencounter.
- (figuratively) Something feigned; a false or pretend appearance; a pretence or stratagem.
- 1712 January 29 (Gregorian calendar), [Philobrune [pseudonym]], “FRIDAY, January 18, 1711–1712”, in The Spectator, number 286; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume III, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC ↗, page 429 ↗:
- [I]f your zeal slackens, how can one help thinking that Mr. Courtly's letter is but a feint to get off from a subject in which either your own, or the private and base ends of others to whom you are partial, or those of whom you are afraid, would not endure a reformation?
- The spelling has been modernized.
- 1843 December 18, Charles Dickens, “Stave Three. The Second of the Three Spirits.”, in A Christmas Carol. In Prose. Being a Ghost Story of Christmas, London: Chapman & Hall, […], →OCLC ↗, pages 111–112 ↗:
- If you had fallen up against him (as some of them did), and stood there; he would have made a feint of endeavouring to seize you, which would have been an affront to your understanding; […]
- 1848 December 18, Charles Dickens, “The Gift Bestowed”, in The Haunted Man and the Ghost's Bargain. A Fancy for Christmas-time, London: Bradbury & Evans, […], →OCLC ↗, page 14 ↗:
- Receiving no reply at all here, from the thoughtful man whom he addressed, Mr. William approached him nearer, and made a feint of accidentally knocking the table with a decanter, to rouse him.
- French: feinte
- German: Finte
- Italian: finta
- Portuguese: finta, drible
- Russian: финт
- Spanish: finta, amago
feint (feints, present participle feinting; simple past and past participle feinted)
- (transitive, boxing, fencing)
- To direct (a blow, thrust, or other offensive movement resembling an attack) on some part of the body, intended to distract from a real attack on another part.
- 1914, Booth Tarkington, “The Imitator”, in Penrod, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, →OCLC ↗, page 231 ↗:
- Even Penrod's walk was affected; he adopted a gait which was a kind of taunting swagger; and, when he passed other children on the street, he practised the habit of feinting a blow; then, as the victim dodged, he rasped out the triumphant horse laugh which he gradually mastered to horrible perfection.
- 1924 October 10, Harold Lamb, “Forward”, in Arthur Sullivant Hoffman, editor, Adventure, volume XLIX, number I, New York, N.Y., London: The Ridgway Company, →OCLC ↗, page 25 ↗, column 1:
- I spurred on the Turani instead of pulling him in, and stood up in the saddle just as we came upon the two. By feinting a slash at one I made him throw up his saber to guard his head. Then, leaning down as the three ponies came together, I cut at the other's neck, getting home over his blade. His mount reared and shelled him out of the saddle like a pea out of a pod.
- (rare) To direct a feint or mock attack against (someone).
- 1857, [Thomas Hughes], “The Fight”, in Tom Brown's School Days. […], Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC ↗, part II, page 323 ↗:
- Feint him—use your legs! draw him about! he'll lose his wind then in no time, and you can go into him.
- To direct (a blow, thrust, or other offensive movement resembling an attack) on some part of the body, intended to distract from a real attack on another part.
- (intransitive, boxing, fencing, also, often, military) To make a feint or mock attack.
- 1880 November 11, Lew[is] Wallace, chapter XVI, in Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC ↗, book fifth, page 387 ↗:
- Ben-Hur feinted with his right hand. The stranger warded, slightly advancing his left arm. Ere he could return to guard, Ben-Hur caught him by the wrist in a grip which years at the oar had made terrible as a vise.
- 1893–1897 (date written), Robert Louis Stevenson, “Swanston Cottage”, in St. Ives: Being the Adventures of a French Prisoner in England, New York, N.Y.: Charles Scribner's Sons, published 1897, →OCLC ↗, page 67 ↗:
- My assailant stood a little; in the thick darkness I could see him bob and sidle as though he were feinting at me for an advantageous onfall.
- French: feinter
- German: fintieren
- Portuguese: lançar um ataque simulado, simular
- Russian: финти́ть
- Spanish: fintar, fintear
Borrowed from French feint, the past participle of feindre: see etymology 1.
Adjectivefeint (not comparable)
- (boxing, fencing, also, often, military) Of an attack or offensive movement: directed toward a different part from the intended strike.
- (obsolete) Feigned, counterfeit, fake.
- 1855, Arthur Pendennis [pseudonym; William Makepeace Thackeray], “Contains Two or Three Acts of a Little Comedy”, in The Newcomes: Memoirs of a Most Respectable Family, volume II, London: Bradbury and Evans, […], →OCLC ↗, page 90 ↗:
- We force ourselves to be hypocrites, and hide our wrongs from them; we speak of a bad father with false praises; we wear feint smiles over our tears and deceive our children—deceive them, do we?
A variant of faint.
Adjectivefeint (not comparable)
- Of lines printed on paper as a handwriting guide: not bold; faint, light; also, of such paper: ruled with faint lines of this sort. [from mid 19th c.]
This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.002
