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faint

adj
/feɪnt/US

Etymology

From Middle English faynt, feynt (“weak; feeble”), from Old French faint, feint (“feigned; negligent; sluggish”), past participle of feindre, faindre (“to feign; sham; work negligently”), from Latin fingere (“to touch, handle, form, shape, frame, form in thought, imagine, conceive, contrive, devise, feign”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeyǵʰ- (“to mold”). Cognate with feign and fiction and more distantly dough.

  1. derived from *dʰeyǵʰ-✻
  2. derived from fingo
  3. derived from faint
  4. inherited from faynt

Definitions

  1. Lacking strength

    Lacking strength; weak; languid; inclined to lose consciousness

    • I felt faint after my fifth gin and tonic.
    • He almost fell faint due to the hot climate.

  2. Lacking courage, spirit, or energy

    Lacking courage, spirit, or energy; cowardly; dejected.

    • Faint heart ne'er won fair lady.

  3. Barely perceptible

    Barely perceptible; not bright, or loud, or sharp.

    • There was a faint red light in the distance.
  4. ›+ 8 more definitions

    1. Performed, done, or acted, weakly

      Performed, done, or acted, weakly; not exhibiting vigor, strength, or energy.

      • faint efforts
      • faint resistance
      • They damned the latest book with faint praise.

    2. Slight

      Slight; minimal.

      • a faint chance
      • do you have the faintest understanding of what they mean?

    3. Sickly, so as to make a person feel faint.

      • Happening to pass a fruiterer’s on their way; the door of which was open, though the shop was by this time shut; one of them remarked how faint the peaches smelled.

    4. The act of fainting, syncope.

      • She suffered another faint.

    5. The state of one who has fainted

      The state of one who has fainted; a swoon.

    6. To lose consciousness through a lack of oxygen or nutrients to the brain, usually as a…

      To lose consciousness through a lack of oxygen or nutrients to the brain, usually as a result of suddenly reduced blood flow (may be caused by emotional trauma, loss of blood or various medical conditions).

      • A fainting fit.
      • If I send them away fasting […] they will faint by the way.
      • But upon hearing the Honour which he intended her , she fainted away , and fell down as Dead at his Feet

    7. To lose courage or spirit

      To lose courage or spirit; to become depressed or despondent.

      • If thou faint in the day of adversity, thy strength is small.

    8. To decay

      To decay; to disappear; to vanish.

      • November 12, 1711, Alexander Pope, letter to Henry Cromwell Gilded clouds, while we gaze upon them, faint before the eye.

The neighborhood

Derived

damn with faint praise, fainten, faint-heart, faintheart, faint-hearted, fainthearted, faint heart never won fair lady, fainthood, faintish, faintling, faintly, faintness, faint of heart, faintward, forfaint, overfaint, praise with faint damns, ultrafaint, faintful, faintless, faintsome, afaint, fainting goat, faintingly, faintingness, fainty, unfainting

Vish — recursive loop

A definitional loop anchored at faint. Each word in the ring is defined by the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself. Scroll to it and watch.

01faint02cowardly03coward04lacks05lack06spiritual07spirit08ghost

A definitional loop anchored at faint. Each word in the ring appears in the definition of the next; follow the chain far enough and it folds back on itself.

8 hops · closes at faint

curated · pre-corpus. live cycle detection across the full graph is the next major milestone.

sense glosses and etymology drawn from English Wiktionary · source · CC-BY-SA