fringe

      English

      Etymology

      From Middle English, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers", "threads", "fringe”) (plural). (Cognates include German Franse and Danish frynse.)

      Pronunciation

      Adjective

      fringe (not comparable)

      1. Outside the mainstream.

      Translations

      outside the mainstream

      Noun

      fringe (plural fringes)

      1. A decorative border.
        the fringe of a picture
      2. A marginal or peripheral part.
        • 2011 September 29, Jon Smith, “Tottenham 3 - 1 Shamrock Rovers”, BBC Sport:
          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.
      3. Those members of a political party, or any social group, holding unorthodox views.
      4. The periphery of a town or city.
        He lives in the fringe of London.
      5. That part of the hair that hangs down above the eyes; bangs.
        Her fringe is so long it covers her eyes.
        • 1915, W.S. Maugham, "Of Human Bondage":
          In a few minutes Mrs. Athelny appeared. She had taken her hair out of the curling pins and now wore an elaborate fringe.
        • 1981, Hilda Doolittle, HERmione, page 155,
          Fayne in the photograph had a fringe, hair frizzed over hidden ears, sleeves over-ornate, the whole thing out of keeping.
        • 2007, Lauraine Snelling, Sophie's Dilemma, page 16,
          Ingeborg knew she wasn′t ready for fringes or short hair like some of the women she′d seen, and she hoped her daughter wasn′t either.
          “No.” Astrid′s tone dismissed Sophie and the fringe as she galloped off to a new topic.
        • 2009, Geraldine Biddle-Perry, Sarah Cheang, Hair: Styling, Culture and Fashion, page 231,
          Set against the seductive visual and textual imagery of these soft-focus fantasy worlds, the stock list details offer the reader a very real solution to achieving the look themselves, ‘Hair, including coloured fringes (obtainable from Joseph, £3.50) by Paul Nix’ (Baker 1972a: 68).
      6. (physics) A light or dark band formed by the diffraction of light.
        Interference fringe.
      7. Non-mainstream theatre.
        The Fringe; Edinburgh Fringe; Adelaide Fringe

      Synonyms

      Derived terms

      Translations

      a decorative border
      peripheral part
      members of a social group holding unorthodox views
      the periphery of a city
      part of the hair
      light or dark band formed by the diffraction of light
      non-mainstream theatre

      Verb

      fringe (third-person singular simple present fringes, present participle fringing, simple past and past participle fringed)

      1. (transitive) To decorate with fringe.
      2. (transitive) To serve as a fringe.

      Translations

      to decorate with fringe
      to serve as a fringe

      Anagrams

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      Last modified on 13 June 2013, at 22:11