Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun Any of numerous rural deities represented as having the body of a man and the horns, ears, tail, and sometimes legs of a goat.
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun In Roman mythology, one of a class of demigods or rural deities, sometimes confounded with satyrs.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun (Rom. Myth.) A god of fields and shipherds, diddering little from the satyr. The fauns are usually represented as half goat and half man.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Roman mythology A
woodland creature withpointed ears ,legs , and shorthorns of agoat and afondness forunrestrained revelry .
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun ancient Italian deity in human shape, with horns, pointed ears and a goat's tail; equivalent to Greek satyr
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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(SAY-tuhr) [Roman name faun] A creature in classical mythology who was part man and part goat.
satyr 2002
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If that statue could move like a faun, that is what
The Harlequinade An Excursion Harley Granville-Barker 1911
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The laws regulating the geographical distribution of animals, and their combination into distinct zoölogical provinces called faunæ, with definite limits, are very imperfectly understood as yet; but so closely are all things linked together from the beginning that I am convinced we shall never find the clew to their meaning till we carry on our investigations in the past and the present simultaneously.
Young Folks' Library, Volume XI (of 20) Wonders of Earth, Sea and Sky Various 1880
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In the condition of organic life when the supremely predatory creature man rose to domination, the species were grouped in those vast organizations which were of old termed faunæ and floræ, but which are now better known as biological fields or provinces.
Domesticated Animals Their Relation to Man and to his Advancement in Civilization Nathaniel Southgate Shaler 1873
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The faun is a natural and delightful link betwixt human and brute life, with something of a divine character intermingled.
Passages from the French and Italian Notebooks, Volume 1. Nathaniel Hawthorne 1834
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The faun is a natural and delightful link betwixt human and brute life, with something of a divine character intermingled.
Passages from the French and Italian Notebooks, Complete Nathaniel Hawthorne 1834
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Continuing the classical themes, one sports the head and horns of a faun set in alternating bands of black and deep red.
Picasso Is Lord of This Manor Michael FitzGerald 2011
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A typical set sees him trotting about like a genteel and very gay faun, throwing out absurdist rants, implausible anecdotes and ludicrous theories.
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It was the first time he had ever given a reading and his story about a faun seeking his first sexual experience in the woods captivated me.
A pleasant but tiring morning... mroctober 2010
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When Proietto returns to dance with them, his wary, hieratic stance is an instant evocation of Nijinsky as the faun himself.
Russell Maliphant Company Judith Mackrell 2010
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