Obs. Also 5 fayne, 5–6 phane, 7 faine; and see VANE. [Common Teut.: OE. fana wk. masc. = OFris. fana, OS. and OHG. fano (Ger. fahne), Goth. fana, ON. (gunn-) fani (Da. fane, Sw. fana; the mod.Icel. fáni, ‘buoyant, high-flying person,’ is unconnected).]

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  1.  A flag, banner, pennant.

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a. 1000.  Boeth. Metr., i. 10.

            Fana hwearfode
scir on sceafte.

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c. 1325.  Coer de L., 3892.

        They trumpyd, and her baners displaye
Off sylk, sendel, and many a fane.

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1459.  Test. Ebor. (Surtees), II. 227. A grete salte salar gilte with banars and fanes.

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1503.  Hawes, The Example of Virtue, iii. 31.

        The towres were hyghe of adamond stones
With fanes wauerynge in the wynde.

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1671.  R. Bohun, Disc. Wind, 71–2. It’s remarquable in dead calms that both the Fanes of ships, & weathercocks by land generally hang Westward.

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1712.  Lond. Gaz., No. 5051/3. Ensigns, Jacks, Pendants and Fanes.

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1806.  Naval Chron., XV. 194. On the fane of her fore-mast, is the date of her being first placed on the steeple, 1710; the figures being pierced through the fane.

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  2.  A weathercock. See VANE.

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c. 1386.  Chaucer, Clerk’s T., 940.

        O stormy poeple, unsad and ever untrewe,
And undiscret, and chaungyng as a fane.

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1483.  Cath. Angl., 122. A Fayne of a schipe … ubi a weder coke.

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c. 1510.  Barclay, The Mirrour of Good Manners (1570), B iv.

        And varying as fanes erect into the winde,
Hath no stable pleasure, ioy nor precogatiue.

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1635[?].  Glapthorne, Lady Mother, III. i., in Bullen, O. Pl. (1883), II. 142.

            Light faines erected on the tops
Of lofty structures.

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1773.  J. Noorthouck, Hist. London, 611. The turret, which is plain, but handsome; and from its top rises a ball that supports the fane.

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