fame

plural fames

1. archaicuncountableusuallySomething said or reported; gossip, rumour.

   There went a fame in Heav'n that he ere long / Intended to create, and therein plant / A generation, whom his choice regard / Should favour […].

   1667, John Milton, “Book I”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, lines 651-4

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   If the accused could produce a specified number of honest neighbours to swear publicly that the suspicion was unfounded, and if no one else came forward to contradict them convincingly, the charge was dropped: otherwise the common fame was held to be true.

   2012, Faramerz Dabhoiwala, The Origins of Sex, Penguin, published 2013, page 23

2. uncountableusuallyOne's reputation.
3. uncountableusuallyThe state of being famous or well-known and spoken of, especially for something positive.

   I find thou art no less than fame hath bruited.

   c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iii]

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   I was about to say that I had known the Celebrity from the time he wore kilts. But I see I will have to amend that, because he was not a celebrity then, nor, indeed, did he achieve fame until some time after I left New York for the West.

   1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC

   Synonyms: famousness · Antonyms: obscurity, unknownness

present singular third person fames · participle present faming · participle past famed · past famed

1. transitiveTo make (someone or something) famous.