feint

Borrowed from French feint (“pretended”), from Old French feindre (“to feign”).

• IPA^(key): /feɪ̯nt/
  • Rhymes: -eɪnt
  • Homophone: faint

feint (third-person singular simple present feints, present participle feinting, simple past and past participle feinted)

1. To make a feint, or mock attack.

feint (not comparable)

1. (obsolete) Feigned; counterfeit.
   • (Can we date this quote by John Locke?)

     Dressed up into any feint appearance of it.

2. (fencing, boxing, war) (of an attack) directed toward a different part from the intended strike

feint (plural feints)

1. A movement made to confuse the opponent; a dummy.
2. That which is feigned; an assumed or false appearance; a pretense or stratagem.
   • Spectator

     Courtley's letter is but a feint to get off.

3. (fencing, boxing, war) An offensive movement resembling an attack in all but its continuance
4. The narrowest rule used in the production of lined writing paper (C19: Variant of FAINT)

Past participle of feindre; from Old French feint, from Latin fictus, probably through the Vulgar Latin form *finctus, with a nasal infix. Compare Italian finto.

• IPA^(key): /fɛ̃/

• Audio

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feint m (feminine singular feinte, masculine plural feints, feminine plural feintes)

1. past participle of feindre
2. third-person singular present indicative of feindre

• fient

feint c (plural feinten, diminutive feintsje)

1. young man
2. boy
3. boyfriend

   Coordinate term: faam

• “feint”, in Wurdboek fan de Fryske taal (in Dutch), 2011