The development of “rapid” from an original sense of “secure” apparently happened first in the adverb and then transferred to the adjective; comparehard in expressions like “to run hard”. The original sense of “secure, firm” is now slightly archaic, but retained in the relatedfasten(“make secure”). Also compare close meaning change fromLatinrapiō(“to snatch”) toLatinrapidus(“rapid, quick”), fromIrishsciob(“to snatch”) toIrishsciobtha(“quick”).
1596 (date written; published1633),Edmund Spenser,A Vewe of the Present State of Irelande[…], Dublin:[…] Societie of Stationers,[…],→OCLC; republished asA View of the State of Ireland[…] (Ancient Irish Histories), Dublin:[…] Society of Stationers,[…] Hibernia Press,[…][b]y John Morrison,1809,→OCLC:
(nuclear physics, of a neutron) Having akinetic energy between 1 million and 20 millionelectron volts; often used to describe the energy state of free neutrons at the moment of their release by anuclear fission ornuclear fusion reaction (i.e., before the neutrons have been slowed down by anything).
Plutonium-240 has a much higher fission cross-section forfast neutrons than for thermal neutrons.
Of a place, characterised by business, hustle and bustle, etc.
1968, Carl Ruhen,The Key Club, Sydney: Scripts, page15:
Sydney is afast city, and the pace is becoming increasingly more frantic.
Causing unusual rapidity of play or action.
afast racket, or tennis court
afast track
afast billiard table
afast dance floor
(computing, of a piece of hardware) Able to transferdata in a short period oftime.
But at the microlevel it consists of an unimaginable number of atoms connected by springy chemical bonds, all jiggling around at a rate that even ourfastest supercomputer might envy.
Since his majesty went into the field, I have seen her rise from her bed, throw her nightgown upon her, unlock her closet, take forth paper, fold it, write upon’t, read it, afterwards seal it, and again return to bed; yet all this while in a mostfast sleep.
Roses, damask and red, arefast flowers of their smells.
(dated) Having an extravagant lifestyle or immoral habits.[from 18th c.]
afast woman
1852, John Swaby,Physiology of the Opera, page74:
[…] we remember once hearing afast man suggest that they were evidently "nobs who had overdrawn the badger by driving fast cattle, and going it high" — the exact signification of which words we did not understand[…]
1867, George W. Bungay, “Temperance and its Champions”, inThe Herald of Health and Journal of Physical Culture[2], volume I, page277:
Had Senator Wilson won the unenviable reputation of being afast man—a lover of wine, or had he shown himself to the public in a state of inebriety, unable to stand erect in Fanueil Hall for instance, leaning upon the desk to “maintain the center of gravity,” and uttering words that fell sprawling in “muddy obscurity” from lips redolent of rum, rendering it necessary for a prompter and an interpreter to sculpture his speech into symmetry for the public ear and the public press, he would have been pelted from his high office with the indignant ballots of his constituents.
You're alone with her at last / And you're waiting 'til you think the time is right / Cause you've heard she's prettyfast / And you're hoping that she'll give you some tonight.
In the context of nuclear reactors or weaponry, fission-spectrum neutrons (neutrons with the spectrum of energies produced by nuclear fission) are frequently referred to asfast neutrons, even though the majority of fission-spectrum neutrons have energies below the 1-million-electron-volt cutoff.
Do asI bid you, ſhut doores after you, Faſt binde,faſt finde, A Prouerbe neuer ſtale in thrifty minde.
1726 October 28, [Jonathan Swift], “The Author Gives Some Account of Himself and Family, His First Inducements to Travel.[…]”, inTravels into Several Remote Nations of the World.[…][Gulliver’s Travels], volume I, London:[…]Benj[amin] Motte,[…],→OCLC, part I (A Voyage to Lilliput),page20:
Nine hundred of the ſtrongeſt Men were employed to draw up theſe Cords by many Pulleys faſtned on the Poles, and thus, in leſs than three Hours, I was raiſed and flung into the Engine, and there tyedfaſt.
Faster than a speeding bit, the internet upended media and entertainment companies. Piracy soared, and sales of albums and films slid. Newspapers lost advertising and readers to websites. Stores selling books, CDs and DVDs went bust. Doomsayers predicted that consumers and advertisers would abandon pay-television en masse in favour of online alternatives.
FromMiddle Englishfasten, fromOld Englishfæstan (verb),Old Englishfæsten (noun) fromFromProto-Germanic*fastāną(“fast”), from the same root asProto-Germanic*fastijaną(“fasten”), derived from*fastuz, and thereby related to Etymology 1.The religious sense is presumably introduced in the Gothic church, fromGothic𐍆𐌰𐍃𐍄𐌰𐌽(fastan,“hold fast (viz. to the rule of abstinence)”). This semantic development is unique to Gothic, the term glosses Greekνηστεύω(nēsteúō), Latinieiuno which do not have similar connotations of "holding fast".The feminine nounOld High Germanfasta likely existed in the 8th century (shift to neuterOld High Germanfasten from the 9th century, whence modernGermanFasten).The Old English noun originally had the sense "fortress, enclosure" and takes the religious sense only in late Old English, perhaps influenced byOld Norsefasta.The use for reduced nutrition intake for medical reasons or for weight reduction develops by the mid-1970s, back-formed from the use of the verbal nounfasting in this sense (1960s).
After the equilibration period, the rats designated for deprivation studies were made tofast for 24, 48, 72, or 96 hr according to experimental design.
(transitive,sciences) To cause (a person or animal) to abstain, especially from eating.
The act or practice offasting, religious abstinence from food.
1677 George Fox,The Hypocrites Fast and Feast Not God's Holy Day, p. 8 (paraphrasing Matthew 6:16-18).
And is it not the Command of Christ, that in theirFast they should not appear unto men to fast?
1878, Joseph Bingham,The Antiquities of the Christian Church, volume 2, page1182:
anciently a change of diet was not reckoned afast; but it consisted in a perfect abstinence from all sustenance for the whole day till evening.
Any of the fasting periods in the liturgical year.
1662 Peter Gunning,The Holy Fast of Lent Defended Against All Its Prophaners: Or, a Discourse, Shewing that Lent-Fast was First Taught the World by the Apostles (1677 [1662]), p. 13 (translation of the Paschal Epistle of Theophilus of Alexandria).
And so may we enter theFasts at hand, beginning Lent the 30th. day of the Month Mechir
1 When an adjective is applied predicatively to something definite, the corresponding "indefinite" form is used. 2 The "indefinite" superlatives may not be used attributively.
1 The indefinite superlative forms are only used in the predicative. 2 Dated or archaic. 3 Only used, optionally, to refer to things whose natural gender is masculine.
