foin
/fɔɪn/
foin noun: a thrust.
Noun (1)
foin (plural foins)
- A thrust.
- And there kyng Arthur smote syr mordred vnder the shelde wyth a foyne of his spere throughoute the body more than a fadom.
"And there King Arthur smote Sir Mordred under the shield, with a foin of his spear, throughout the body, more than a fathom."1485, Thomas Malory, Le Morte Darthur Book XXI, Chapter iiij, leaf 424r - They move their hands, steadfast their feet remain, / Nor blow nor foin they struck or thrust in vain.1600, Edward Fairfax (translator), Jerusalem Delivered, Tasso, XII, lv
- And there kyng Arthur smote syr mordred vnder the shelde wyth a foyne of his spere throughoute the body more than a fadom.
Verb
foin (third-person singular simple present foins, present participle foining, simple past and past participle foined)
- To thrust with a sword; to stab at.
- And then he flue on hir as he were wood, / And on hir breeche did hack and foyne a-good.1593, Thomas Nashe, The Choice of Valentines, lines 140-141
- They lash, they foin, they pass, they strive to bore / Their corselets, and the thinnest parts explore.1700, [John] Dryden, “Palamon and Arcite: Or, The Knight’s Tale. In Three Books.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC
- To prick; to sting.
Noun (2)
foin (plural foins)
- The beech marten (Martes foina, syn. Mustela foina).
- A kind of fur, black at the top on a whitish ground, taken from the ferret or weasel of the same name.
- He came to the stake in a fair black gown furred and faced with foins.1642, Thomas Fuller, The Holy State, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] Roger Daniel for John Williams, […], →OCLC
Synonyms of foin
18 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Forms of foin
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | foins |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | foins |
| present participle | foining |
| past participle | foined |
| past | foined |
Origin of foin
From Old French foene (“harpoon, fizgig”), from Latin fuscina (“trident”).
From French fouine (“a marten”).
Words formed from foin
Words that rhyme with foin
6 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about foin
- What does foin mean?
- Foin means a thrust.
- What part of speech is foin?
- Foin can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce foin?
- Foin is pronounced /fɔɪn/.
- What is the plural of foin?
- The plural of foin is foins.
Words near foin in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: foin (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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-foin.wav.
Cite this entry: “foin.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/foin. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.