fess
/fɛs/
fess verb: to confess; to admit.
Verb
fess (third-person singular simple present fesses, present participle fessing, simple past and past participle fessed)
- To confess; to admit.
Noun (1)
fess (plural fesses)
- A horizontal band across the middle of the shield.
- Lord Robert Walsingham de Vere St. Simon, second son of the Duke of Balmoral—Hum! Arms: Azure, three caltrops in chief over a fess sable.1892, Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor, Norton, published 2005, page 294
- The space where the arms of Wolsey used to be is being repainted with his own newly granted arms: azure, on a fess between three lions rampant or, a rose gules, barbed vert, between two Cornish choughs proper.2009, Hilary Mantel, Wolf Hall, Fourth Estate, published 2010, page 420
Adjective
fess
- Proud; conceited.
- Y'll be fess enough, my poppet, when th'st know!"1891, Thomas Hardy, Tess of the d'Urbervilles, volume 1, London: James R. Osgood, McIlvaine and Co., page 32
- Lively; active; strong.
- Of animals, bad-tempered, fierce.
Noun (2) capitalized: FESS
FESS
- Initialism of functional endoscopic sinus surgery.
Proper noun capitalized: Fess
Fess (plural Fesses)
- A surname from German.
Examples of fess in a sentence
- A fess dancetté has only three teeth in the whole width of the escutcheon.
- A chevron couché is one which emerges from one side of the escutcheon and has its apex on the opposite side, or at the fess point.
- Pop superstar Robbie Williams appears to have ’fessed up to the crime.
Forms of fess
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | fesses |
| present participle | fessing |
| past participle | fessed |
| past | fessed |
| alternative form | 'fess |
| Noun | |
| plural | fesses |
| alternative form | fesse |
| alternative form | feese |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Fesses |
Origin of fess
Clipping of confess.
From Middle English fesse, from Old French fesse, an alteration of faisse, from Latin fascia. Cognate with fajita, fascia, and fascism.
From German Fess, a variant of Feese.
Words formed from fess
Phrases with fess
Words that rhyme with fess
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- SMS
- success
- compress
- largesse
- ness
- profess
- confess
- distress
- regress
- depress
- excess
- guess
- prepossess
- undress
- CBS
- ingress
- oppress
- redress
- transgress
- assess
- cess
- duress
- fluoresce
- Hesse
- less
- mayoress
- obsess
- tress
- unless
- yes
- accresce
- acquiesce
- aggress
- BESS
- caress
- clothes press
- congress
- defervesce
- digress
- ess
- foulness
- Hess
- intumesce
- jess
- lazy S
- liquesce
- repress
- second-guess
Questions about fess
- What does fess mean?
- Fess means to confess; to admit.
- What part of speech is fess?
- Fess can be a verb, a noun, an adjective or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce fess?
- Fess is pronounced /fɛs/.
- What is the past tense of fess?
- The past tense of fess is fessed.
Words near fess in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: fess (page history and authors); FESS (page history and authors); Fess (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-fess.wav.
Cite this entry: “fess.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/fess. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.