fringe
noun
- long or short lengths of straight or twisted thread, cord, or tassel, used as trimming
verb
No English definition recorded for this entry.
L331775 on Wikidata ↗Wiktionary
Pronunciation: /fɹɪnd͡ʒ/
adj
Etymology: From Middle English frenge, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, a metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers, threads, fringe”, plural), of uncertain origin. Compare German Franse and Danish frynse. Displaced native Middle English fnæd (“fringe”), Middle English byrd (“fringe”), Middle English fasel (“fringe”) from Old English fæs (“fringe”), and Old English fnæs (“fringe”). Doublet of fimbria.
- Outside the mainstream.
“So was the cellist Charlotte Moorman, muse to Nam June Paik and proactivist champion of all things fringe.”
noun
Etymology: From Middle English frenge, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, a metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers, threads, fringe”, plural), of uncertain origin. Compare German Franse and Danish frynse. Displaced native Middle English fnæd (“fringe”), Middle English byrd (“fringe”), Middle English fasel (“fringe”) from Old English fæs (“fringe”), and Old English fnæs (“fringe”). Doublet of fimbria.
- A decorative border.
“the fringe of a picture”
“The walls were hung with blue silk, edged with silver fringe; and the closely-drawn blue velvet curtains swept the ground.”
- A decorative border.
“He walked up the heath’s western edge, beside a fringe of scrub where hogweed grew in tangles and brambles rose taller than him.”
- A marginal or peripheral part.
“the confines of grace and the fringes of repentance”
“Dos Santos, who has often been on the fringes at Spurs since moving from Barcelona, whipped in a fantastic cross that Pavlyuchenko emphatically headed home for his first goal of the season.”
- A group of people situated on the periphery of a larger community.
“About an hour later, the two were sitting at a comparatively isolated table in a restaurant called Sickler’s, downtown, a highly favored place among, chiefly, the intellectual fringe of students at the college—the same students, more or less, who, had they been Yale or Harvard men, might rather too casually have steered their dates away from Mory’s or Cronin’s.”
- A group of people situated on the periphery of a larger community.
“a fringe group of the party”
- The periphery of an area, especially a town or city.
“He lives on the fringe of London.”
“Moreover, although a number of lines penetrate to the fringes of the English Lake District, this is the only one which actually passes through it.”
- The periphery of an area, especially a town or city.
“All the fringe people thought it was such a good house, ingenious in fact, and erected similar makeshift housing for themselves.”
- Synonym of bangs: hair hanging over the forehead, especially a hairstyle where it is cut straight across.
“Her fringe is so long it covers her eyes.”
“In a few minutes Mrs. Athelny appeared. She had taken her hair out of the curling pins and now wore an elaborate fringe.”
- A light or dark band formed by the diffraction of light.
“interference fringe”
- Non-mainstream theatre.
“The Fringe”
“Edinburgh Fringe”
- The peristome or fringe-like appendage of the capsules of most mosses.
- The area around the green.
- A daypart that precedes or follows prime time.
verb
Etymology: From Middle English frenge, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, a metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers, threads, fringe”, plural), of uncertain origin. Compare German Franse and Danish frynse. Displaced native Middle English fnæd (“fringe”), Middle English byrd (“fringe”), Middle English fasel (“fringe”) from Old English fæs (“fringe”), and Old English fnæs (“fringe”). Doublet of fimbria.
- To decorate with fringe.
“[Y]onder cloud / That rises upward always higher, / And onward drags a labouring breast, / And topples round the dreary west, / A looming bastion fringed with fire.”
“Presently she saw the King's palace. Pillars of ice held up the roof fringed with icicles, which would have sparkled splendidly if there had been any sun.”
- To serve as a fringe; to border.
“Purple bonnets fringed soft, pink, querulous faces on pillows in bath chairs.”
“The Japanese Archipelago, fringing the eastern edge of Asia, has a rich avifauna, including what is probably the rarest bird in the world - the Toki or Japanese Crested Ibis, and one of the most recently discovered birds - the Okinawa Rail.”