fantasia

Etymology

It is borrowed from Italian fantasia (“fancy”),^{[2][3][4][5][6]} which Tommaseo's Italian dictionary also defined as an instrumental composition that sounds extemporaneous.^[2] The Italian word is from Latin phantasia, meaning imagination in Late Latin and a mental image in the classical language,^[6] from Ancient Greek φαντασία (phantasía, “appearance, imagination, image”),^[7][3] from φαντάζω (phantázō, “to make visible”).^[7] Etymonline traces it further to Proto-Indo-European *bha- (“to shine”).^[3] The same Latin word came into English earlier, through Old French, as fantasy.^[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A musical composition in which form is subordinate to fancy: 1724, in a Short Explication of Foreign Words in Musick Books.^[2][3][6]

Semantic evolution

Merriam-Webster Unabridged applies the word to the contrapuntal instrumental pieces of the 16th and 17th centuries, akin to the motet,^[6] which Collins also calls a fancy.^[8] It was used for free instrumental compositions that sound improvised,^[3][6] and later for pieces built on one or several familiar tunes, a potpourri.^[8][9] From 1818 it was also used of other things fanciful in form.^[2] In the Levant and North Africa the Italian word was current for ostentation and pomp, and for an Arab dance or display of horsemanship, which English travellers recorded from 1838.^[2][9] American drug slang of 2001 used it for dimethyltryptamine, after its hallucinogenic effects.^[10]

Timeline

• 1724 – music, a composition in which form is subordinate to fancy.^[2][3][6]
• 1818 – transferred and figurative uses.^[2]
• 1838 – an Arab dance, or a display of horsemanship by Arab riders.^[2][9]
• 2001 – drug slang, dimethyltryptamine.^[10]

Meanings

Noun

1. A musical composition free in form, sounding improvised.^[8][6][2]
2. An instrumental composition of the 16th and 17th centuries in contrapuntal style, akin to the motet; a fancy.^[6][8]
3. A composition weaving together familiar tunes; a potpourri or medley: a fantasia on sea shanties.^[8][9][6]
4. A display of horsemanship and dancing by Arab riders.^[9][2]
5. (slang) Dimethyltryptamine, a hallucinogenic drug.^[10]

Related words

• fantasy
• fancy
• fantastic
• phantasm

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d e Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
9. ^ a b c d e Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com