Word.ws English Dictionary

finifugal

UK/ˌfɪnɪˈfjuːɡəl/

finifugal adjective: averse to something ending (e.g. a TV series) out of a desire for it to continue on forever.

Adjective

finifugal (comparative more finifugal, superlative most finifugal)

  1. (rare) Averse to something ending (e.g. a TV series) out of a desire for it to continue on forever.
    • […] he could hardly remember an instance in which a classical writer referred to the setting sun; the fact was, that they disliked the idea of sunset, and recoiled from the end of everything. Whether he was right—nay, whether he was quite serious in this opinion I am not certain. In modern as well...1884, Tollemache, Mr. and Mrs. Lionel Arthur, “Recollections of Dean Stanley”, in Safe studies, page 374
    • I am feeling finifugal, and I have to say goodbye to my dictionaries.2013, Mark Forsyth, “Epilogue”, in The Horologicon, London: Icon Books, →ISBN, page 237

Examples of finifugal in a sentence

  • In modern as well as in ancient times, the finifugal tendency, as we may call it, is apparent.1884, Tollemache, Mr. and Mrs. Lionel Arthur, “Recollections of Dean Stanley”, in Safe studies, page 374:
  • That meter and measure are one; meter and moon and mensesare one; meter and month and meal do the same work, measuring time?And we’re back to shunning the end of anything: finifugal.2016, Shepard, Neil, “"Last Resorts"”, in Sewanee Review, volume 124, number 1, pages 17-18:

Forms of finifugal

comparativemore finifugal
superlativemost finifugal

Origin of finifugal

From Latin fīnis (“end”) + -fugal.

Questions about finifugal

What does finifugal mean?
Finifugal means averse to something ending (e.g. a TV series) out of a desire for it to continue on forever.
How do you use finifugal in a sentence?
In modern as well as in ancient times, the finifugal tendency, as we may call it, is apparent.
What part of speech is finifugal?
Finifugal is an adjective.
How do you pronounce finifugal?
Finifugal is pronounced /ˌfɪnɪˈfjuːɡəl/ (UK).

Words near finifugal in the dictionary

  1. finiff
  2. finiffs
  3. finified
  4. finifies
  5. finifs
  6. finifugal
  7. finify
  8. finifying
  9. Finigan
  10. Finigans
  11. Finighan

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: finifugal (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:

Cite this entry: “finifugal.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/finifugal. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.