different between fag vs faw

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fæ?/
• Rhymes: -æ?

Etymology 1

Probably from fag end (“remnant”), from Middle English fagge (“flap”)

Noun

fag (plural fags)

1. (US, technical) In textile inspections, a rough or coarse defect in the woven fabric.
2. (Britain, Ireland, Australia, colloquial, dated in US and Canada) A cigarette.
   • 1968 January 25, The Bulletin, Oregon,

     He?d Phase Out Fag Industry

     Los Angeles (UPI) - A UCLA professor has called for the phasing out of the cigarette industry by converting tobacco acres to other crops.

   • 2001, Oliver Sacks, Uncle Tungsten: Memories of a Chemical Boyhood, Alfred A. Knopf (2001), 15,

     All of them, like my mother, were heavy smokers, and after warming themselves by the fire, they would sit on the sofa and smoke, lobbing their wet fag ends into the fire.

   • 2011, Bill Marsh, Great Australian Shearing Stories, unnumbered page,

     So I started off by asking the shearers if they minded if I took a belly off while they were having a fag. Then after a while they were asking me. They?d say, ‘Do yer wanta take over fer a bit while I have a fag?’ And then I got better and I?d finish the sheep and they?d say ‘Christ, I haven?t finished me bloody fag yet, yer may as well shear anotherie.’

3. (Britain, obsolete, colloquial) The worst part or end of a thing.

Synonyms

• (cigarette): ciggy (Australia), smoke, (Cockney rhyming slang) oily rag

Derived terms

• fag end
• fag packet

Translations

Etymology 2

Akin to flag (“droop, tire”). Compare Dutch vaak (“sleepiness”).

Noun

fag (plural fags)

1. (Britain, dated, colloquial) A chore: an arduous and tiresome task.
   • 1818, Jane Austen, Northanger Abbey, 1992, Complete Works of Jane Austen, p. 123:

     We are sadly off in the country; not but what we have very good shops in Salisbury, but it is so far to go—eight miles is a long way; Mr. Allen says it is nine, measured nine; but I am sure it cannot be more than eight; and it is such a fag—I come back tired to death.

2. (Britain, education, archaic, colloquial) A younger student acting as a servant for senior students.
   • 1791, Richard Cumberland, The Observer, Vol. 4, page 67:

     I had the character at ?chool of being the very be?t fag that ever came into it.

   • 1991, Stephen Fry, The Liar, p. 18:

     A gang of fags was mobbing about by the notice-boards. They fell silent as he approached. He patted one of them on the head. ‘Pretty children,’ he sighed, digging into his waistcoat pocket and pulling out a handful of change. ‘Tonight you shall eat.’ Scattering the coins at their feet, he moved on.

Verb

fag (third-person singular simple present fags, present participle fagging, simple past and past participle fagged)

1. (transitive, colloquial, used mainly in passive form) To make exhausted, tired out.
2. (intransitive, colloquial) To droop; to tire.
   • a. 1829, G. Mackenzie, Lives, quoted in 1829, "Fag", entry in The London Encyclopaedia: Or, Universal Dictionary, Volume 9, page 12,

     Creighton with-held his force 'till the Italian began to fag, and then brought him to the ground.

3. (intransitive, Britain, education, archaic, colloquial) For a younger student to act as a servant for senior students in many British boarding schools.
4. (transitive, Britain, education, archaic, colloquial) To have (a younger student) act as a servant in this way.
5. (intransitive, Britain, archaic) To work hard, especially on menial chores.

Derived terms

• (to act as a servant): fagger, faggery, fagging (as a noun), fagmaster
• (to tire): fagged out

Etymology 3

From faggot.

Noun

fag (plural fags)

1. (chiefly US, Canada, vulgar, usually offensive, sometimes endearing) A homosexual man, especially (usually derogatory) an especially effeminate or unusual one.
   • 1921 John Lind, The Female Impersonators (Historical Documentation of American Slang v. 1, A-G, edited by Jonathan E. Lighter (New York: Random House, 1994) page 716.

     Androgynes known as “fairies,” “fags,” or “brownies.”
2. (US, vulgar, offensive) An annoying person.

   Why did you do that, you fag?

Usage notes

In North America, fag is often considered highly offensive, although some gay people have tried to reclaim it. (Compare faggot.) The humorousness of derived terms fag hag and fag stag is sometimes considered to lessen their offensiveness.

Synonyms

• (male homosexual): See Thesaurus:homosexual person
• (annoying person): See Thesaurus:jerk

Derived terms

• fag hag
• fag stag

Translations

Anagrams

• Afg., gaf

Aromanian

Alternative forms

• fagu, fau

Etymology

From Latin f?gus. Compare Romanian fag.

Noun

fag m (plural fadz)

1. beech

Derived terms

• fagã

Related terms

• fãdzet

Danish

Etymology

From German Fach (“compartment, drawer, subject”), from Old High German fah (“wall”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fa???/, [?fæ?j], [?fæ?], IPA^(key): [?f?w-] (in derivatives)

Noun

fag n (singular definite faget, plural indefinite fag)

1. subject (of study)
2. trade, craft, profession
3. bay (the distance between two vertical or horizontal supports in roofs and walls)

Derived terms

• fagfelt
• fagmand
• faglig
• faglitteratur
• skolefag

Inflection

Icelandic

Etymology

Borrowed from Danish fag, itself a borrowing from German Fach.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [fa??]
• Rhymes: -a??

Noun

fag n (genitive singular fags, nominative plural fög)

1. subject (particular area of study)

Declension

Synonyms

• (subject): námsgrein

Norwegian Bokmål

Etymology

From Middle Low German or German Low German fak; compare with German Fach

Noun

fag n (definite singular faget, indefinite plural fag, definite plural faga or fagene)

1. subject (e.g., at school)
2. profession, trade, discipline

Derived terms

References

• “fag” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology

From Middle Low German or German Low German fak; compare with German Fach

Noun

fag n (definite singular faget, indefinite plural fag, definite plural faga)

1. subject (e.g., at school)
2. profession, trade, discipline

Derived terms

References

• “fag” in The Nynorsk Dictionary.

Polish

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fak/

Noun

fag m anim

1. phage

Declension

Romanian

Etymology 1

From Latin f?gus, from Proto-Italic *f?gos, from Proto-Indo-European *b?eh??os (“beech tree”).

Noun

fag m (plural fagi)

1. beech (tree of genus Fagus)

Declension

Related terms

• f?get

Etymology 2

From Latin favus, from Proto-Indo-European *b??w- (“to swell, grow, thrive, be, live, dwell”).

Noun

fag n (plural faguri)

1. (archaic) honeycomb

Synonyms

• fagure

Welsh

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /va?/

Noun

fag

1. Soft mutation of bag.

Mutation

Etymology 2

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /va??/

Noun

fag

1. Soft mutation of mag.

Mutation

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /f??/
• Rhymes: -??

Etymology 1

Onomatopoetic.

Interjection

faw

1. Alternative form of faugh

Synonyms

• (disgust): bleah, eww, ick, pooh, uck; see also Thesaurus:yuck
• (contempt): feh, pfaugh, pish, pshaw, pooh; see also Thesaurus:bah

Etymology 2

Phonetic rendering of for.

Preposition

faw

1. Pronunciation spelling of for; chiefly used to represent the accent of slaves in the United States.
   • 1907, George Washington Cable, Old Creole Days, Gutenberg eBook #10234,

     “ […] Now, Colossus, what air you a-beckonin? at me faw?”

Etymology 3

From the surname Faa.

Noun

faw (plural faws)

1. A gypsy.

Anagrams

• FWA, WAF

Scots

Etymology

From Middle English fawe, fa?e, from Old English f?g, f?h (“coloured; stained; dyed; tinged; shining; variegated”), from Proto-West Germanic *faih, from Proto-Germanic *faihaz (“coloured; motley”), from Proto-Indo-European *pey?- (“to paint; mark; colour”).

Adjective

faw (comparative mair faw, superlative maist faw)

1. Of various colours; variegated