fun

Pronunciation

• IPA: /fʌn/^[1]

Etymology

It comes from a 17th-century verb meaning “to cheat, hoax”,^[2][3][4] probably a dialect variant of Middle English fonnen (“to make a fool of, be foolish”),^[2][5][6] from fon (“a fool”), a word of unknown origin and the source of fond.^[6][5][7] Barnhart notes that the OED took fun for a dialect pronunciation of fon, while others reject any connection.^[5]

Earliest recorded meaning

The verb “to cheat, hoax” is from 1685,^[8] and the noun “a trick, a hoax” from 1699^[9] or about 1700.^[2]

Semantic evolution

The sense “amusement” is found in Swift's Miscellanies (1727),^[5][2] and Johnson in 1755 dismissed the word as “a low cant word”.^[5][10] It was rarely recorded in the 18th century,^[2] but the old idea of a trick survives in make fun of (1737).^[2] Funny is from 1756,^[5] “comical” in the mid-18th century and “strange” in the late 18th,^[10] and the novelist Ian Hay coined funny ha-ha and funny peculiar in The Housemaster (1936).^[10] The verb “to joke” is from 1833,^[2][11] and the adjective “enjoyable” from 1846.^[2][11] Fun and games is from 1906.^[2] The attributive use, as in a fun time, became popular in the 1950s and 1960s.^[12]

Timeline

• 1685 – verb, to cheat.^[8]
• 1699 – noun, a hoax.^[9]
• 1727 – amusement (Swift).^[5]
• 1737 – make fun of.^[2]
• 1755 – “a low cant word” (Johnson).^[5]
• 1756 – funny.^[5]
• 1833 – verb, to joke.^[2]
• 1906 – fun and games.^[2]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. Enjoyment, amusement, light-hearted pleasure.
2. A source of enjoyment.
3. Playful, often noisy activity.
4. (in make fun of) Ridicule.

Adjective

1. (informal) Enjoyable, amusing: a fun evening.

Verb

1. (informal) To joke or play.

Word family

• funster
• funny
• funplex
• funfair
• funfest
• fun and games

Related words

• fond

Usage notes

The American Heritage Dictionary explains the adjective fun as a playful reanalysis of sentences such as it is fun to ski, where fun behaves like an adjective; the use became popular in the 1950s and 1960s.^[12]

References

1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
6. ^ a b Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
10. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
12. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin