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fey.

About to die; doomed; on the verge of sudden or violent death.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/feɪ/
  1. About to die; doomed; on the verge of sudden or violent death.

    archaic · dialectal · poetic
  2. Dying; dead.

    obsolete
  3. Possessing second sight, clairvoyance, or clairaudience.

    Ireland · Scotland
  4. Overrefined, affected.

  5. Strange or otherworldly.

  6. Spellbound.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English feye (“fated to die”), from Old English fǣġe (“doomed to die, timid”), from Proto-West Germanic *faigī, from Proto-Germanic *faigijaz (“cowardly, wicked”), from Proto-Indo-European *peyk- (“ill-meaning, bad”). Akin to Old Saxon fēgi, whence Dutch veeg (“doomed, near death”), Old High German feigi (“appointed for death, ungodly”) whence German feige (“cowardly”), Old Norse feigr (“doomed”) whence the Icelandic feigur (“doomed to die”), Old English fāh (“outlawed, hostile”). More at foe.

adj/feɪ/
  1. Magical or fairylike.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English faie, fei (“a place or person possessed with magical properties”), from Middle French feie, fee (“fairy", "fae”), from Old French fae, from Medieval Latin fāda. More at fairy.

noun/feɪ/
  1. A fairy.

    countable · uncountable
  2. Fairy folk collectively.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English faie, fei (“a place or person possessed with magical properties”), from Middle French feie, fee (“fairy", "fae”), from Old French fae, from Medieval Latin fāda. More at fairy.

verb/feɪ/
  1. To cleanse.

    UK · dialectal · obsolete · transitive
    to fey a drain or ditch
Where this word comes from

Inherited from Middle English feien (“to cleanse”), from Old Norse fægja (“to cleanse, polish”), from Proto-Germanic *fēgijaną (“to decorate, make beautiful”), from Proto-Indo-European *pōḱ-, *pēḱ- (“to clean, adorn”). Cognate with Swedish feja (“to sweep”), Danish feje (“to sweep”), German fegen (“to cleanse, scour, sweep”), Dutch vegen (“to sweep, strike”). More at feague, fake, fair.

noun/feɪ/
  1. Alternative form of pe (“Semitic letter”).

    alt-of · alternative
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.