adjectivea. Having or displaying an otherworldly, magical, or fairylike aspect or quality: “She's got that fey look as though she's had breakfast with a leprechaun” (Dorothy Burnham).
b. Having visionary power; clairvoyant.
c. Appearing touched or crazy, as if under a spell.
- Scots
a. Fated to die soon.
b. Full of the sense of approaching death.
Origin:
Origin: Middle English feie, fated to die
Origin: , from Old English fǣge
.
Related Forms:
Word History: The history of the words
fey and
fay illustrates a rather fey coincidence. Our word
fay, “fairy, elf,” the descendant of Middle English
faie, “a person or place possessed of magical properties,” and first recorded around 1390, goes back to Old French
fae, “fairy,” the same word that has given us
fairy. Fae in turn comes from Vulgar Latin
Fāta, “the goddess of fate,” from Latin
fātum, “fate.” If
fay goes back to fate, so does
fey in a manner of speaking, for its Old English ancestor
fǣge meant “fated to die.” The sense we are more familiar with, “magical or fairylike in quality,” seems to have arisen partly because of the resemblance in sound between
fay and
fey.