foul

CEFRB2

/faʊl/

adjective · noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    adjective

    Very unpleasant, dirty, or offensive.

  2. 02

    noun

    An unfair or illegal action in a sport.

Examples

  • It's foul of you to have concealed it.

  • No love is foul nor prison fair.

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
5

Deep Dive

adjective

Extra meanings

  1. Detestable, unpleasant, loathsome.

  2. Obscene, vulgar or abusive.

  3. Covered with, or containing unclean matter; dirty.

More examples

In context

  • His foul hands got dirt all over the kitchen.

  • The air was so foul nobody could breathe.

  • This cloth is too foul to use as a duster.

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

There was a blank smell coming from the old garbage.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

adjective

Inherited from Middle English ffoul, foul, foull, fowel, fowle, fuyle, voul, vul, from Old English fūl (“foul, dirty, unclean, impure, vile, corrupt, rotten, stinking, guilty”), from Proto-West Germanic *fūl, from Proto-Germanic *fūlaz (“foul, rotten”), from Proto-Indo-European *puH- (“foul, rotten”). Cognates Cognate with Central Franconian fuul (“putrid, rotten; lazy, workshy”), Cimbrian baul, vaul (“putrid, rotten”), Dutch vuil (“dirty, foul; lewd, obscene; dishonorable; illegal”), German faul (“foul, putrid, rotten; lazy”), Yiddish פֿױל (foyl, “putrid; lazy”), Danish ful (“nasty, ugly”), Icelandic fúll (“foul, rotten, sullen”), Norwegian Bokmål and Norwegian Nynorsk ful (“clever, sly”),...