▪ I. font, n.1
(fɒnt)
Forms: 1 font, fant, 2–6 funt(e, Orm. funnt (4 fant), 4–7 fount(e, (4 founȝt, fownte), 5–6 fonte, 2– font.
[OE. font, fant, ad. Eccl. Lat. font-em or fontes (baptismi), lit. ‘fountain’ or ‘fountains (of baptism)’, a specific use of L. font-em, fons: see fount. In ME. the compound font-stone had the same sense. In sense 3 it may be regarded as a different word, a var. of fount, refashioned after the Lat. etymon.
Cf. also F. fonts pl. (OF. fonce), Pr. font, Pg. and OSp. fonte (mod.Sp. fuente), It. fonte, of same meaning. Prob. by adoption from Eng., the word appears early in other Teut. langs.: OFris. font, funt, MDu. vonte (mod.Du. in comb. doopvont, from doop baptism), ON. funt-r (Sw. funt, dopfunt, Da. font, dobfont).]
1. A receptacle, usually of stone, for the water used in the sacrament of baptism. Also, font of baptism, baptismal font. to stand at font for (a person): to be sponsor to.
| c 1000 Canons ælfric xxxvi, Ne do man nænne ele to þam fante. a 1175 Cott. Hom. 241 ælc cristen man anon se stepð up of þe funte wer he ifulled is. a 1225 St. Marher. 1 Euch ifulhet in font oþe almihti federes nome. c 1380 Sir Ferumb. 548 Y-vollid on þe haly fant. 1447 O. Bokenham Seyntys (Roxb.) 111 Crystnyd I was in a funt of stoon. 1523 Ld. Berners Froiss. I. ccccii. 698 They..brake downe the fownte wherin the erle was christned. 1611 Coryat Crudities 35 A Font of baptisme, made of porphyrie stone. a 1658 Cleveland To T. C. 14 A gray Bark That stood at Font for Noah's Ark. 1756–7 Keysler's Trav. (1760) 490 The large marble font is divided by four partitions. 1865 Kingsley Herew. Prel. 6 The curse which Dunstan had pronounced against him at the baptismal font. |
b. pl. (with singular sense). rare. (Cf. Fr. fonts, Eccl. Lat. fontes a font.)
The pl. has been explained as referring to the compound fonts of several basins found in some early baptisteries. But prob. fontes baptismi, originally meant only ‘the fountains (i.e. the waters) of baptism’, the application as the name of the vessel being secondary.
| 1877 J. D. Chambers Div. Worship 186 The Fonts at the West end of the Nave. |
2. transf. a. A receptacle for holy water. b. The reservoir for oil in a lamp.
| 1542–5 Brinklow Lament. (1874) 100 The wyne wyll waxe sower and stincke, as doth their holy water in the founte by longe kepinge. 1644 Ord. Parlt. in Vestry Bks. (Surtees) 322–3 Noe Copes, Surplices..or Holy water Fonts, to be any more used. 1872 O. Shipley Gloss. Eccl. Terms, Holy Water Font. 1891 Sale Catal. Glass Wks., Stourbridge, Two hundred and fifty-five lamp fonts. |
3. = fount. Now only poet.
| 1611 Coryat Crudities 26 Delicate fonts and springes. 1658 J. Jones Ovid's Ibis 2nd Ded., On Parnasse hill rose the Nectarian Font. 1735 Somerville Chase iii. 342 Adown His tortur'd Sides the Crimson Torrents roll From many a gaping Font. c 1750 Shenstone Elegies i. 46 Near font or stream, in meditation, rove. 1878 B. Taylor Deukalion iv. ii, The font Bubbling and brightening with an inward life, Spins up in silver, tinkling as it falls. |
4. attrib. and Comb., as font-cloth, font-cover, font-taper, font-vat; also font-name, (one's) baptismal name; † font-wife, ? a woman appointed to collect donations at baptisms.
| 1553 Inv. in Trans. Essex Archæol. Soc. (1884) 10 Itm. a *ffownte clothe. 1885 R. W. Dixon Hist. Ch. Eng. III. 450 Font-cloths with altar-cloths. |
| a 1661 Fuller Worthies, Hartfordshire ii. (1662) 20 Seeing his own *font-name was a Papall one. 1679 Burnet Hist. Ref. (1865) I. 150 note, It seems unlikely that he [Bonner] alone in the grace should be written by his font name when all the others were by their surname. |
| 1519 in W. L. Nash Churchw. Acc. St. Giles, Reading (Camden) 5, Ij standerds and the *ffont taper. |
| c 1000 in Thorpe Ags. Hom. II. 268 Hæðen cild..bið ᵹebroht synfull..to ðam *fant-fæte. c 1220 Bestiary 108 Naked [he] falleð in ðe funt-fat, and cumeð ut al newe. |
| 1569 Churchw. Acc. Stanford in Antiquary Apr. (1888) 169 Eliza Yat..and Elenor Sauere were chossen *fount wyeffs this yer, but the gathered nothing this yer. |
▪ II. font, n.2
(fɒnt)
Also 7 fonte.
[ad. Fr. fonte, f. fondre to melt, cast.]
1. a. The action or process of casting or founding. lit. and fig. rare. b. concr. Cast iron.
| 1578 Inventories (1815) 249 Ane moyane of fonte markit with the sallamandre having ane new stok without yron werk. 1676 Marvell Mr. Smirke 34 A Sermon..that was preached before His Majesty, and by his special command to be Printed, is it seems making over again, there having been sure some error in the Fonte. 1883 C. C. Perkins Ital. Sculpt. 273 When the figure was ready to be cast in bronze, Michelangelo seems suddenly to have remembered that, as he knew nothing of the processes of the font, he could not [etc.]. |
2. Printing. (In England usually fount, q.v.)
▪ III. † font, v. Obs.
[f. prec. n.]
trans. To ‘christen’, name.
| 1652 Persuasive to Compliance 17 Flattery, rather then Truth, fonted them Fathers of their Country. a 1659 Osborn Queries Wks. (1673) 593 It being likelier to have been the voice of Custom than Reason that fonted a bare Knowledge in Tongues with the title of Learning. |