forfeit

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English forfet, also forfait,^[2][3] borrowed from Old French forfet, also forfait (“crime, punishable offence”),^[4][5][6] originally the past participle of forfaire (“to transgress”).^[5][3][7] The Anglo-Norman noun is recorded from 1121–25, with senses ranging from misdeed and offence to a thing forfeited and a fine.^[8] The French verb is formed from fors- (“outside, beyond”) and faire (“to do”),^[7][9][6] and corresponds to Medieval Latin forisfactum (“trespass, fine”), the past participle of forisfaciō (“to transgress”),^[4][10][11] from Latin forīs (“outside”) and faciō (“to do”).^[4][5][9] The idea is acting outside, that is beyond what the law permits.^[12][11][13] The verb is from the noun,^[4][14] or partly from the Anglo-Norman past participle.^[5][3] The word is related to foreign and fact.^[5][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

As a verb, to do wrong, sin, transgress: before 1325, in the Prose Psalter.^[4] The noun, a misdeed or crime, is first recorded in Gower's Confessio Amantis (1393) in the OED and the MED,^[4][2] but Barnhart finds it before 1376 in Piers Plowman,^[3] and Merriam-Webster dates it to the 13th century.^[14]

Semantic evolution

In Middle English the noun meant a misdeed or offence, and also something to which the right was lost through a misdeed.^[5][2] The penalty sense, a fine or a thing lost through a crime or a breach of contract, took over from the 15th century, and the "crime" sense died out after 1668.^[4][6] Weekley explains the modern meaning from the confiscation that followed a crime.^[15] The verb followed the same path, from "to transgress" (until 1533) to "to lose by misconduct" (about 1400) and, in law, to lose property as a penalty (1466).^[4] From Shakespeare's time a forfeit was also a trivial fine for breaking a rule in a club or tavern, and an article given up in certain games;^[4][6] Collins records forfeits as the name of such a game.^[16] Johnson (1755) defined the noun as something lost by a crime, a fine, and quoted Measure for Measure.^[17] In Scots forfeit long kept the sense of an offence or fault.^[18]

Timeline

• before 1325 – verb, to transgress, sin (obsolete by 1533).^[4]
• before 1376 – noun, a penalty for a crime, in Piers Plowman.^[3]
• 1393 – noun, a misdeed or crime (obsolete by 1668); also adjective, lost as a penalty.^[4][2]
• c. 1400 – verb, to lose by misconduct.^[4]
• 1466 – verb, to lose (property) as a legal penalty.^[4]
• before 1475 – noun, a thing lost through a crime or fault; a fine.^[4]
• before 1616 – a trivial fine or an article given up in a game, in Shakespeare.^[4]
• 1727 – verb, intransitive, to incur a forfeit.^[4]

Meanings

Noun

1. Something lost, given up or paid as a penalty for an offence, a mistake or a breach of contract.^[16][14][4]
2. The act of losing something as a penalty; forfeiture.^[16][4]
3. An article given up, or a task performed, by a player who breaks a rule in a game.^[16][4] In the plural, a game played in this way.^[16]
4. (obsolete, 1393–1668) A misdeed or crime.^[4][14][2]

Verb

1. To lose, or lose the right to, something as a penalty for an offence or a failure: Anyone who misses the deadline will forfeit the deposit.^[16][14][4]
2. To incur a forfeit or the penalty of forfeiture.^[14][4]
3. (obsolete, 1325–1533) To do wrong; to transgress.^[4][14][19]

Adjective

1. Lost or liable to be given up as a penalty: Their stake was forfeit once they broke the agreement.^[14][4][19]

Word family

• forfeitable
• forfeiter
• forfeiture
• unforfeited

Related words

• foreign
• fact
• feat
• foreclose

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
3. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d e f Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c d Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
7. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ Anglo-Norman Dictionary (AND2), Aberystwyth University, anglo-norman.net (2nd ed., 2005–)
9. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
11. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
12. ^ Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
13. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
14. ^ a b c d e f g h Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
15. ^ Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
16. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
17. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
18. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
19. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press