fringe
UK/fɹɪnd͡ʒ/
fringe noun: a decorative border.
Noun
fringe (plural fringes)
- A decorative border.
- the fringe of a picture
- The walls were hung with blue silk, edged with silver fringe; and the closely-drawn blue velvet curtains swept the ground.1834, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter XI, in Francesca Carrara. […], volume I, London: Richard Bentley, […], (successor to Henry Colburn), →OCLC, page 118
- A marginal or peripheral part.
- the confines of grace and the fringes of repentance1651–1653, Jer[emy] Taylor, ΕΝΙΑΥΤΟΣ [Eniautos]. A Course of Sermons for All the Sundays of the Year. […], 2nd edition, London: […] Richard Royston […], published 1655, →OCLC
- 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.2011 September 29, Jon Smith, “Tottenham 3 - 1 Shamrock Rovers”, in BBC Sport
- A group of people situated on the periphery of a larger community.
- About an hour later, the two were sitting at a comparatively isolated table in a restaurant called Sickler’s, downtown, a highly favored place among, chiefly, the intellectual fringe of students at the college—the same students, more or less, who, had they been Yale or Harvard men, might rather too...1955, J. D. Salinger, “Franny”, in Franny and Zooey, Boston, Mass.: Little, Brown and Company, published 1991, →ISBN, page 10
- Those members of a political party, or any social group, holding extremist or unorthodox views.
- a fringe group of the party
- The periphery of an area, especially a town or city.
- He lives on the fringe of London.
- Moreover, although a number of lines penetrate to the fringes of the English Lake District, this is the only one which actually passes through it.1961 October, ""Voyageur"", “The Cockermouth, Keswick & Penrith Railway”, in Trains Illustrated, page 598
- Synonyms:
- outskirts
- Used attributively with reference to Aboriginal people living on the edge of towns etc.
- All the fringe people thought it was such a good house, ingenious in fact, and erected similar makeshift housing for themselves.2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo, published 2012, page 20
- Synonym of bangs: hair hanging over the forehead, especially a hairstyle where it is cut straight across.
- Her fringe is so long it covers her eyes.
- In a few minutes Mrs. Athelny appeared. She had taken her hair out of the curling pins and now wore an elaborate fringe.1915, W[illiam] Somerset Maugham, “Chapter LXXXVIII”, in Of Human Bondage, New York, N.Y.: George H[enry] Doran Company, →OCLC
- Synonyms:
- bangs
- A light or dark band formed by the diffraction of light.
- interference fringe
- Non-mainstream theatre.
- The Fringe
- Edinburgh Fringe
- The peristome or fringe-like appendage of the capsules of most mosses.
- The area around the green.
- A daypart that precedes or follows prime time.
Adjective
fringe (comparative more fringe or fringer, superlative most fringe or fringest)
- Outside the mainstream.
- So was the cellist Charlotte Moorman, muse to Nam June Paik and proactivist champion of all things fringe.2015 September 7, Holland Cotter, “Exhibitions Where Moral Force Trumps Market Forces”, in New York Times
- Synonyms:
- nonmainstream, marginal, peripheral, alternative, fringy
Verb
fringe (third-person singular simple present fringes, present participle fringing, simple past and past participle fringed)
- To decorate with fringe.
- [Y]onder cloud / That rises upward always higher, / And onward drags a labouring breast, / And topples round the dreary west, / A looming bastion fringed with fire.1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XV”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 24
- Presently she saw the King's palace. Pillars of ice held up the roof fringed with icicles, which would have sparkled splendidly if there had been any sun.1887, Louisa M[ay] Alcott, “The Frost King and How the Fairies Conquered Him”, in Lulu’s Library, volume II, Boston, Mass.: Roberts Brothers, →OCLC, page 10
- To serve as a fringe; to border.
- Purple bonnets fringed soft, pink, querulous faces on pillows in bath chairs.1922, Virginia Woolf, chapter 2, in Jacob's Room
- The Japanese Archipelago, fringing the eastern edge of Asia, has a rich avifauna, including what is probably the rarest bird in the world - the Toki or Japanese Crested Ibis, and one of the most recently discovered birds - the Okinawa Rail.1982, A Field Guide to the Birds of Japan, Tokyo: Kodansha International, page 8
fringe meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
fringe in Hindi
- fringe, frill, hem, garnish, trimming, border, edge
- झालर jhālar
fringe in Tamil
- ஓரம், சிறுசிறு, துணை, விளிம்பு, தொங்கல், உடையின் ஓர அலங்காரம்
fringe in Marathi
- फ्रिंज
fringe in Urdu
- جھالر, کنارہ
More languagesFewer languages
- fringe in Bengali
- ফ্রিংজ
- fringe in Malayalam
- കുഞ്ചം, അഞ്ചലം, തൊങ്ങൽ വയ്ക്കുക, അരിക്
- fringe in Kannada
- ಮುಂಗುರುಳು, ಅಂಚು, ಸೆರಗು, ಅರುಗು
- fringe in Punjabi
- ਝਾਲਰ jhālar
- fringe in Gujarati
- ફ્રિંજ, ફ્રિન્જ
- fringe in Odia
- ଫ୍ରିଞ୍ଜ୍, ଫ୍ରିଞ୍ଜ
- fringe in Sanskrit
- दशा daśā
- fringe in Assamese
- চুলা sula
- fringe in Nepali
- फ्रिंज, फ्रिन्ज
- fringe in Tagalog
- palawingwing
- fringe in Arabic
- هُدْب hudb, هُدُب hudub
Examples of fringe in a sentence
- He’s not a fringe figure: he knows how to work the attention economy.
- We definitely did a panel on feminism together, maybe also a fringe event at a Tory conference.
- Her fringe was damp and uncrimped and sticking, like seaweed straggling on a rock, to her forehead.
Synonyms of fringe
Forms of fringe
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | fringes |
| Adjective | |
| comparative | more fringe |
| comparative | fringer |
| superlative | most fringe |
| superlative | fringest |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | fringes |
| present participle | fringing |
| past participle | fringed |
| past | fringed |
Origin of fringe
From Middle English frenge, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, a metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers, threads, fringe”, plural), of uncertain origin. Compare German Franse and Danish frynse. Displaced native Middle English fnæd (“fringe”), Middle English byrd (“fringe”), Middle English fasel (“fringe”) from Old English fæs (“fringe”), and Old English fnæs (“fringe”). Doublet of fimbria.
Words formed from fringe
- fringe church
- fringe meeting
- fringe theory
- befringe
- defringe
- donkey fringe
- fringe benefit
- fringecup
- fringe dweller
- fringefan
- fringehead
- fringeless
- fringelet
- fringelike
- fringepod
- fringer
- fringe time
- fringe-toed lizard
- fringe tree
- Fringeverse
- fringeworthy
- fringie
- fringy
- gold fringe
- hoary fringe moss
- interfringe
- lunatic fringe
- Newgate fringe
- nonfringe
- rurban fringe
- underfringe
- vortex fringe
- woolly fringe moss
Phrases with fringe
Words that rhyme with fringe
Questions about fringe
- What does fringe mean?
- Fringe means a decorative border.
- What is fringe in Hindi?
- Fringe in Hindi is झालर (jhālar). See Fringe meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is fringe?
- Fringe can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
- How do you pronounce fringe?
- Fringe is pronounced /fɹɪnd͡ʒ/ (UK).
- What is the plural of fringe?
- The plural of fringe is fringes.
Words near fringe in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: fringe (page history and authors); झालर (Hindi) (page history and authors); fringe (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); fringe (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); fringe (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); fringe (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); fringe (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); fringe (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਝਾਲਰ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); fringe (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); fringe (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); চুলা (Assamese) (page history and authors); fringe (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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: en-us-fringe.ogg.
Cite this entry: “fringe.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/fringe. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.