Etymograph

English

foeman

Foeman comes from Middle English foman ‘an enemy, devil, demon’, and goes back to Old English fāhman.

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150fāhman‘enemy’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500foman‘an enemy, devil, demon’
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1590foeman

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed

Lineage

  1. Old Englishc. 450–1150fāhman‘enemy’
  2. Middle Englishc. 1150–1500foman‘an enemy, devil, demon’
  3. Englishearliest quotation 1590foeman

Earliest quotation: 1590, Edmund Spenser, Book I, Canto VII: “a snaggy Oke, which he had torne / Out…”

A compound of foe + man

Proto-Germanic *faihaz

…

Old English fāh ‘hostile’

Old English ġefāh ‘enemy’

Middle English ifa

Middle English fo

English foe

Proto-Germanic *mann- ‘human being, person, man’

Proto-West Germanic *mann ‘person’

Old English mann ‘human being, person, man’

Middle English man

English man

Every English word from Old English fāhman

Today it means

noun An enemy; a foe in battle; an armed or unarmed adversary; a demon.

Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word.

Etymograph / Old English fāhman / foeman

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