Meanings
plural faitours · alternative faitor · alternative faytor · alternative fayter
- obsoleteA charlatan or imposter, especially one pretending to be ill, or to tell fortunes.
Into new woes vnweeting I was cast, / By this false faytor[…].
1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC2 more examples
Allas sayd kynge Lot I am ashamed / for by my defaute ther is many a worshipful man slayne / for and we had ben to gyders there hadde ben none hooste vnder the heuen that had ben abel for to haue matched with vs / This fayter with his prophecye hath mocked me
Alas, said King Lot, I am ashamed, for through my absence many a distinguished man has been slain, for if we had been together there would have been no host under heaven that could have matched us; this faitour has mocked me with his prophecy.
1485, Sir Thomas Malory, chapter X, in Le Morte Darthur, book IIQuick, now, little faitour. What do you want to know about Gondal?
1969, Robert Nye, Tales I Told My Mother
Origin
- Latinfactor, factōrem
- Anglo-Normanfaitour
- Middle Englishfaytour
- Englishfaitour
From Middle English faytour, from Anglo-Norman faitour (cognate with Old French faitor (“doer, maker”), from Latin factor, factōrem, from facere (“do, make”).
More words from Middle English, Anglo-Norman, Latin
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
faitour. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 4, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/faitour
“faitour.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/faitour. Accessed November 4, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “faitour,” accessed November 4, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/faitour.
Source: faitour on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.