Fromfair(“community gathering, market”). In the sense of food, because cakes and sweets were sold at fairs.
fairing (pluralfairings)
- (now archaic) Agift or other souvenir bought at afair.[from 16th c.]
1962,JW Goethe, translated byWH Auden andElizabeth Mayer,Italian Journey, Penguin, published1970, page28:She told me she was on her way to the fair in Bolzano and assumed I was going there too. Should we meet there, I must buy her afairing[translatingJahrmarkt].
- (now rare) Apresent, especially given by alover.[from 16th c.]
- (Scotland, Ireland, now rare) Something that isdeserved; one'sdeserts.[from 18th c.]
- A type of smallgingerbread biscuit; aginger nut.[from 19th c.]
1857,Thomas Hughes,Tom Brown's School Days[1], Part I, Chapter 2:[…] the ground[…] was already being occupied by the “cheap Jacks,” with their green-covered carts and marvellous assortment of wares; and the booths of more legitimate small traders, with their tempting arrays offairings and eatables; and penny peep-shows and other shows, containing pink-eyed ladies, and dwarfs, and boa-constrictors, and wild Indians.
Fromfair(“to smoothen or even a surface”).
fairing
- presentparticiple andgerund offair
fairing (pluralfairings)
- Acovering on various parts of a vehicle, for example anaircraft,automobile, ormotorcycle, thatstreamlines it (i.e., produces a smooth exterior and reducesdrag).[from 20th c.]
1950 October, H. C. Casserley, “Locomotive Cavalcade, 1920-1950—4”, inRailway Magazine, page660:Thefairing over the driving motion of this engine, and of the 4-6-2s, was removed subsequently, to give greater accessibility to the working parts.
- “fairing”, inWebster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.:G. & C. Merriam,1913,→OCLC.
- James A. H. Murrayet al., editors (1884–1928), “Fairing”, inA New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (Oxford English Dictionary), volume IV (F–G), London:Clarendon Press,→OCLC,page29, column 1.
