faux

See also: Faux

English

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from French faux. Doublet of false.

Pronunciation

• (UK) enPR: fō, IPA^(key): /fəʊ/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (US) enPR: fō, IPA^(key): /foʊ/
• Homophones: foe, pho
• Rhymes: -əʊ

Adjective

faux (not comparable)

1. Fake or artificial.

   Synonyms: cod, mock

   Antonym: genuine

   • 2008, James Chandler, Maureen N. McLane, The Cambridge Companion to British Romantic Poetry:

     He modernizes the faux-archaic “withouten wind, withouten tide” to the more pointed and concrete “without a breeze, without a tide.”

   • 2012, Susan Crabtree, Peter Beudert, Scenic Art for the Theatre: History, Tools and Techniques, page 392:

     Because mahoganies yield a supple fine-grained wood, they are often used as veneer wood. With proper technique and graining tools, all of these variations can be produced in faux wood.

   • 2012, Annie Padden Jubb, David Jubb, LifeFood Recipe Book: Living on Life Force, page 196:

     Run grapes, either frozen, chilled, or room temperature, through your juicer for an incredible grape faux wine.

   • 2021 February 7, Daniel Kreps, “Watch ‘Saturday Night Live’ Skewer Super Bowl Sunday”, in Rolling Stone‎:

     The pregame crew then showed a pair of faux-Super Bowl ads, including an unnecessarily woke Cheez-It commercial and a Papa John’s ad that fully embraces Pizzagaters.

   • 2022 November 21, Julie Creswell, “Beyond Meat Is Struggling, and the Plant-Based Meat Industry Worries”, in The New York Times‎:

     Its faux burgers and sausages were landing on dinner plates in homes throughout the United States and on the menu boards of chans like Subway, Carl’s Jr. and Starbucks.

Derived terms

• fauxcest
• faux contact
• faux Cyrillic
• fauxgasm
• faux gras
• fauxgressive
• fauxhawk
• fauxhemian
• fauxlex
• fauxligraphy
• fauxlography
• fauxmance
• fauxminist
• fauxmosexual
• fauxnetic
• Faux News
• fauxpen
• fauxpology
• faux queen
• fauxtatoes
• fauxtina
• fauxtograph
• fauxtography
• fauxtomation
• sourfaux

 

Related terms

• faux ami
• faux bois
• faux pas

 

Translations

fake or artificial

Chinese: Mandarin: 仿製 / 仿制 (zh) (fǎngzhì) Dutch: nep-, onecht (nl), vals (nl) Esperanto: falsa, artefarita Finnish: teko- (fi), keinotekoinen (fi) French: faux (fr) German: falsch (de), künstlich (de), unecht (de) Irish: bréag- Romanian: fals (ro), contrafăcut (ro) Russian: фальши́вый (ru) (falʹšívyj), иску́сственный (ru) (iskússtvennyj) (artificial) Spanish: falso (es)

French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /fo/, (in liaison) /fo.z‿/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -o

Etymology 1

Inherited from Middle French faulx, from Old French fauz, faus, fals, from Latin falsus.

Adjective

faux (feminine fausse, masculine plural faux, feminine plural fausses)

1. false; untrue
2. false; not real

   Antonyms: vrai, réel, authentique

Derived terms

• aile fausse
• alpiste faux-roseau
• archi-faux
• archifaux
• baldingère faux-roseau
• démêler le vrai du faux
• être faux comme un jeton
• faire fausse queue
• faire fausse route
• faire faux bond
• fausse bannière
• fausse bonne idée
• fausse chanterelle
• fausse cigüe
• fausse ciguë
• fausse clé
• fausse couche
• fausse girolle
• fausse maigre
• fausse manip
• fausse manœuvre
• fausse modestie
• fausse note
• fausse panne
• fausse piste
• fausse poche
• fausse porte
• fausse position
• fausse rose de Jéricho
• faussement
• faux air
• faux anglicisme
• faux bonhomme
• faux bourdon
• faux cèpe
• faux cils
• faux client
• faux col
• faux cul
• faux départ
• faux derche
• faux drapeau
• faux emploi
• faux frais
• faux frère
• faux gallicisme
• faux indigo
• faux indigotier
• faux jeton
• faux jour
• faux jumeaux
• faux maigre
• faux négatif
• faux nez
• faux orme de Sibérie
• faux ourlet
• faux pas
• faux plafond
• faux plancher
• faux plat
• faux positif
• faux procès
• faux réséda
• faux saunage
• faux saunier
• faux séné
• faux témoignage
• faux témoin
• faux-acacia
• faux-ami
• faux-cils
• faux-col
• faux-filet
• faux-fruit
• faux-poids
• faux-poivrier
• faux-poivrier odorant
• faux-saunage
• faux-saunier
• faux-vin
• illusion de fausse montée
• porter à faux
• règle de fausse position
• robinier faux-acacia
• se faire des fausses idées
• sonner faux
• s’inscrire en faux
• vrai-faux

 

Related terms

• fausser
• fausseté

 

See also

• faux-filet

Descendants

• → English: faux

Adverb

faux

1. badly; inaccurately; untruly

Etymology 2

Inherited from Middle French faulx, from Old French fauz, from Latin falcem, from Proto-Indo-European *dʰelk-, *dʰelg- (“a cutting tool”).

Noun

une faux

faux f (plural faux)

1. scythe

Related terms

• faucille f

See also

• serpe f

Etymology 3

Inherited from Old French fail, faus, from Latin fallō, fallis.

Verb

faux

1. first/second-person singular present indicative of faillir

Further reading

• “faux”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Latin

Alternative forms

• fōx

Etymology

Unknown. Possibly related to Ancient Greek χᾰ́ος (kháos, “abyss, chasm”).

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /fau̯ks/, [fäu̯ks̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /fau̯ks/, [fäu̯ks]

Noun

faux f (genitive faucis); third declension (rare)

1. singular of faucēs (“throat, gorge”)

This entry needs quotations to illustrate usage. If you come across any interesting, durably archived quotes then please add them!

Usage notes

The word is rarely used in the singular, and only in the ablative (in poems) and nominative (only attested once).

Inflection

Third-declension noun (i-stem).

	singular	plural
nominative	faux	faucēs
genitive	faucis	faucium
dative	faucī	faucibus
accusative	faucem	faucēs faucīs
ablative	fauce	faucibus
vocative	faux	faucēs

Derived terms

• see: fōx

Descendants

(See also fōx.)

• → Italian: fauce

References

• “faux”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “faux”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• faux in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• De Vaan, Michiel (2008) Etymological Dictionary of Latin and the other Italic Languages (Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series; 7), Leiden, Boston: Brill, →ISBN, page 207

Middle French

Adjective

faux m (feminine singular fauce, masculine plural faux, feminine plural fauces)

1. Alternative form of faulx

Norman

Etymology 1

From Old French faulz, the plural of fault, ultimately from Latin falsus.

Adjective

faux m

1. (Jersey) false

Derived terms

• faussement (“falsely”)
• faux sîngne (“forgery”)

 

Etymology 2

From Latin falx, from Proto-Indo-European *dhalk-, *dhalg- (“a cutting tool”).

Noun

faux f (plural faux)

1. (Jersey) scythe