different between foul vs unkind

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: foul, IPA^(key): /fa?l/
• Rhymes: -a?l
• Homophone: fowl
• Rhymes: -a??l

Etymology 1

From Middle English foul, from Old English f?l (“foul, unclean, impure, vile, corrupt, rotten, guilty”), from Proto-Germanic *f?laz (“foul, rotten”), from Proto-Indo-European *puH- (“to rot”). Cognate with Dutch vuil (“foul”), German faul (“rotten, putrid”), Danish and Swedish ful (“foul”), and through Indo-European, with Albanian fëlliq (“to make dirty”), Latin puter (“rotten”). More at putrid.

Ancient Greek ?????? (phaûlos, “bad”) is a false cognate inasmuch as it is not from the same etymon, instead being cognate to few.

Adjective

foul (comparative fouler, superlative foulest)

1. Covered with, or containing unclean matter; dirty.

2. (of words or a way of speaking) obscene, vulgar or abusive.

3. Detestable, unpleasant, loathsome.
   • c. 1610-11, William Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act II scene ii^[1]:

     […] Hast thou forgot / The foul witch Sycorax, who with age and envy / Was grown into a hoop? Hast thou forgot her?
4. Disgusting, repulsive; causing disgust.

5. (obsolete) Ugly; homely; poor.
6. (of the weather) Unpleasant, stormy or rainy.
7. Dishonest or not conforming to the established rules and customs of a game, conflict, test, etc.

8. (nautical) Entangled and therefore restricting free movement, not clear.

9. (baseball) Outside of the base lines; in foul territory.

Usage notes

• Nouns to which "foul" is often applied: play, ball, language, breath, smell, odor, water, weather, deed.

Synonyms

• (hateful, detestable): shameful; odious; wretched

Derived terms

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English foulen, fulen, from Old English f?lian (“to become foul; rot; decay”), from Proto-Germanic *f?l?n? (“to rot; decay”).

Verb

foul (third-person singular simple present fouls, present participle fouling, simple past and past participle fouled)

1. (transitive) To make dirty.

   to foul the face or hands with mire

   She's fouled her diaper.

2. (transitive) To besmirch.

   He's fouled his reputation.

3. (transitive) To clog or obstruct.
4. (transitive, nautical) To entangle.
   • 1941, Emily Carr, Klee Wyck, Chapter 18, [2]

     The Indian's heart was sore for his boat; it looked as if nothing could save her. She was drifting more slowly now, her propeller fouled in kelp.

   The kelp has fouled the prop.

5. (transitive, basketball) To make contact with an opposing player in order to gain advantage.

   Smith fouled him hard.

6. (transitive, baseball) To hit outside of the baselines.

   Jones fouled the ball off the facing of the upper deck.

7. (intransitive) To become clogged.

   The drain fouled.

8. (intransitive) To become entangled.

   The prop fouled on the kelp.

9. (intransitive, basketball) To commit a foul.

   Smith fouled within the first minute of the quarter.

10. (intransitive, baseball) To hit a ball outside of the baselines.

    Jones fouled for strike one.

Derived terms

• foul one's own nest

Translations

Noun

foul (plural fouls)

1. (sports) A breach of the rules of a game, especially one involving inappropriate contact with an opposing player in order to gain an advantage; for example, tripping someone up in soccer, or contact of any kind in basketball.
2. (bowling) A (usually accidental) contact between a bowler and the lane before the bowler has released the ball.
3. (baseball) A foul ball, a ball which has been hit outside of the base lines.

   Jones hit a foul up over the screen.

Descendants

• ? Russian: ??? (fol)

Translations

See also

• foul fish

Further reading

• foul in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• foul in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• foul at OneLook Dictionary Search

Anagrams

• fluo-

German

Verb

foul

1. singular imperative of foulen
2. (colloquial) first-person singular present of foulen

Middle English

Etymology 1

From Old French fol.

Noun

foul

1. Alternative form of fole (“fool”)

Etymology 2

From Old English fugol.

Noun

foul

1. Alternative form of fowel

English

Etymology

From un- +? kind.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?n?ka?nd/
• Rhymes: -a?nd

Adjective

unkind (comparative unkinder or more unkind, superlative unkindest or most unkind)

1. Lacking kindness, sympathy, benevolence, gratitude, or similar; cruel, harsh or unjust; ungrateful. [From mid-14thC.]
   • c. 1599, William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act III, Scene 2,^[1]

     Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him!

     This was the most unkindest cut of all;

     For when the noble Caesar saw him stab,

     Ingratitude, more strong than traitors’ arms,

     Quite vanquish’d him: then burst his mighty heart;

   • 1720, Alexander Pope (translator), The Iliad of Homer, London: W. Bowyer and Bernard Lintott, Volume 6, Book 24, lines 968-971, p. 189,^[2]

     Yet was it ne’er my Fate, from thee to find

     A Deed ungentle, or a Word unkind:

     When others curst the Auth’ress of their Woe,

     Thy Pity check’d my Sorrows in their Flow:

   • 1814, Jane Austen, Mansfield Park, Chapter 2,^[3]

     Nobody meant to be unkind, but nobody put themselves out of their way to secure her comfort.

   • 1950 July 3, Politicians Without Politics, Life, page 16,

     Despite the bursitis, Dewey got in a good round of golf, though his cautious game inspired a reporter to make one of the week?s unkindest remarks: “He plays golf like he plays politics — straight down the middle, and short.”

   • 1974, Laurence William Wylie, Village in the Vaucluse, 3rd Edition, page 175,

     We had to learn that to refuse such gifts, which represented serious sacrifice, was more unkind than to accept them.

   • 2000, Edward W. Said, On Lost Causes, in Reflections on Exile and Other Essays, page 540,

     In the strictness with which he holds this view he belongs in the company of the novelists I have cited, except that he is unkinder and less charitable than they are.

2. (obsolete) Not kind; contrary to nature or type; unnatural. [From 13thC.]
   • 1582, Stephen Batman (translator), Batman vppon Bartholome His Booke De Proprietatibus Rerum, London, Book 7, Chapter 33,^[4]

     […] A Feauer is an vnkinde heate, that commeth out of the heart, and passeth into all the members of the bodye, and grieueth the working of the bodye.

   • 1617, John Davies, Wits Bedlam, London, Epigram 116,^[5]

     Crowes will not feed their yong til 9. daies old,

     Because their vnkind colour makes them doubt

     Them to be theirs;

3. (obsolete) Having no race or kindred; childless.
   • 1593, William Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis,^[6]

     O, had thy mother borne so hard a mind,

     She had not brought forth thee, but died unkind.

Derived terms

• unkindest cut

Related terms

• unkindly
• unkindness

Anagrams

• Dunkin, nudnik