Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A student at a boarding school who is required to perform menial tasks for a student in a higher grade.
  • noun A drudge.
  • noun Fatiguing or tedious work; drudgery.
  • intransitive verb To exhaust; weary.
  • intransitive verb To work to exhaustion; toil.
  • intransitive verb To function as the servant of another student in a boarding school.
  • noun A cigarette.
  • noun Used as a disparaging term for a gay man.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The fringe at the end of a piece of cloth, or at the end of a rope.
  • noun The end; fag-end.
  • noun A knot or blemish in the web of cloth; an imperfect or coarse part of such a web.
  • noun Long, coarse grass.
  • To become weary; fail in strength; be faint with weariness.
  • To labor hard or assiduously; work till wearied.
  • To act as a fag; perform menial services for another.
  • To tire by labor; exhaust: often with out.
  • To use or treat as a fag or drudge; compel to labor for one's benefit; cause to perform menial services for one.
  • To beat.
  • To become untwisted, as the end of a rope; ravel: usually with out.
  • noun A mink.
  • noun A laborious drudge.
  • noun In certain English public schools, as Eton, Harrow, and Winchester, a schoolboy of a lower class who performs menial services for another boy who is in the highest or next highest form or class, having to prepare his breakfast, carry messages, etc., in return for which protection and assistance in various ways are accorded. The system of fagging is now much milder than formerly.
  • noun A fatiguing or tiring piece of work; a wearisome task.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • transitive verb To tire by labor; to exhaust.
  • transitive verb rare Anything that fatigues.
  • transitive verb (Med.) See Cerebropathy.
  • noun Slang, disparaging. a male homosexual; -- always used disparagingly and considered offensive. Shortened form of faggot.
  • noun obsolete A knot or coarse part in cloth.
  • intransitive verb To become weary; to tire.
  • intransitive verb To labor to wearness; to work hard; to drudge.
  • intransitive verb To act as a fag, or perform menial services or drudgery, for another, as in some English schools.
  • intransitive verb to become untwisted or frayed, as the end of a rope, or the edge of canvas.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun vulgar, offensive A homosexual person, especially a male.
  • noun colloquial, disparaging A particularly conspicuous non-straight-acting homosexual male.
  • noun US, colloquial, vulgar, pejorative An annoying person.
  • noun UK, colloquial A chore; an arduous and tiresome task.
  • noun UK, archaic, colloquial Term used in UK public schools for a younger student acting as a servant for senior students.
  • verb transitive, colloquial, used mainly in passive form To make exhausted, tired out.
  • verb intransitive, colloquial To droop; to tire.
  • verb UK, archaic, colloquial For a younger student to act as a servant for senior students in UK public schools.
  • noun US, technical In textile inspections, a rough or coarse defect in the woven fabric.
  • noun US, technical A photovoltaic cell that is no longer in use.
  • noun UK, Ireland, colloquial A cigarette.
  • noun UK, obsolete, colloquial The worst part or end of a thing.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • verb exhaust or get tired through overuse or great strain or stress
  • verb act as a servant for older boys, in British public schools
  • noun finely ground tobacco wrapped in paper; for smoking
  • verb work hard
  • noun offensive term for an openly homosexual man

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[From fag, to droop (obsolete), perhaps from Middle English fagge; see fag end.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for faggot.]

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Short for fag end.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From faggot

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Probably alteration of flag ("droop, tire")

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Probably from fag end ("remnant"), from Middle English fagge ("flap")

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Examples

Comments

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  • Bearing in mind that a fag is generally taken to mean a cigarette in the UK.

    January 6, 2007

  • Can't be fagged - can't be bothered. Fagged out - tired.

    January 16, 2007

  • ...the fagged whale abated his speed...

    - Melville, Moby-Dick, ch. 73

    July 26, 2008

  • The sheep-louse. Whence fags, a disease of sheep; lousiness. --Terms listed in Dr. Jamieson's Scottish Dictionary and Supplement, 1841.

    May 17, 2011