Forms: 4–5 foun(e, (5 fowen), 5 faon, 5–7 fawne, 6–7 faun(e, 5– fawn. [a. OF. faon, also foun, feon:—med.L. *fētōn-em, f. fœtus offspring.]
† 1. A young animal, cub. Obs.
[1274. Grands Chron. S. Denis (Rer. Gall. & Franc. Script. [1818], XVII. 354). Jones fauns de bestes sauvages.]
1481. Caxton, Mirrour of the World, II. vi. This beest hath but ones yong fawnes.
a. 1603. Jas. I, Psalm xxix. 6.
| Lyke to the faune of unicornis | |
| Will leape when he doth speik. |
1603. G. Owen, Pembrokeshire, I. xv. (1892), 127. The fawne [of a seal] at the first is white, and is more delicate meate, then his Ancestor being strong and fullsome to eate, Yet is yt accompted a dayntye and a rare dishe of manie men.
2. A young fallow deer, a buck or doe of the first year. In fawn (said of the doe): pregnant.
c. 1369. Chaucer, Dethe Blaunche, 429.
| Of founes, soures, bukkes, does | |
| Was ful the wode. |
c. 1400. Maundev. (Roxb.), xxxi. 143. Dappeld and spotted, as it ware founez of daes.
1486. Bk. St. Albans, E iv a. And ye speke of the Bucke the fyrst yere he is a fawne.
1535. Coverdale, Jer. xiv. 5. The Hynde shal forsake the yonge fawne, that she bringeth forth in ye felde, because there shalbe no grasse.
1667. Milton, P. L., IV. 404.
| Then as a Tiger, who by chance hath spi’d | |
| In some Purlieu two gentle Fawnes at play. |
1774. Goldsm., Nat. Hist. (1776), III. 137. The fawns continue to follow the deer eight or nine months in all.
1810. Scott, Lady of L., III. ii.
| The doe awoke, and to the lawn, | |
| Begemm’d with dewdrops, led her fawn. |
1872. Baker, Nile Tribut., ii. 38. Already some of the mimosas begin to afford a shade, under which the gazelles may be surely found at midday; the does are now in fawn, and the young will be dropped when this now withered land shall be green with herbage.
fig. 1609. Heywood, Brit. Troy, XV. xxxii.
| That her commensed spleene may be withdrawne | |
| From them, whose violence spar’d not her Fawne. |
3. Short for fawn-color (see 4).
1892. Pall Mall G., 17 March, 1/2. A Russian costume in fawns made of fancy crépon. Ibid., 22 Sept., 1/3. Slight moustache and hair of a fawn that we associate rather with Caledonia than the Netherlands.
4. attrib. and Comb., as fawn-color, a light yellowish brown (hence fawn-colored adj.); fawn-skin; also fawn-brown, -like adjs.
1800. trans. Lagrange’s Chem., II. 177. They acquire a strong *fawn-brown tint.
1865. Gosse, Year at Shore, 79. Light olive, fawn-brown … or pure white.
1800. trans. Lagrange’s Chem., II. 284. Of a red, inclining to *fawn-colour.
1844–57. G. Bird, Urin. Deposits (ed. 5), 133. Every shade of intensity of tint, from the palest fawn-colour to the deepest amber or orange-red, may be observed in these deposits; and hence the terms yellow or red sand are applied to them.
1803. Davy, in Phil. Trans., XCIII. 261. They gave dense *fawn-coloured precipitates.
1891. E. Peacock, Narcissa Brendon, II. 391. The little fawn-coloured bullocks.
1838. Lytton, Leila, I. iv. That elastic and *fawn-like grace.
1862. Shirley, Nugæ Crit., iii. 152. Little cousin Annie, with her shy fawn-like glances.
1513. Douglas, Æneis, VII. vii. 126. Sum wer cled in pilchis of *foune skynnis.
1774. J. Bryant, A New System; or, an Analysis of Ancient Mythology, I. 10. Nebros, which was substituted by the Greeks for Nimrod, signifying a fawn, gave occasion to many allusions about a fawn, and fawn-skin, in the Dionusiaca, and other mysteries.
1864. Swinburne, Atalanta, 1389.
| Bacchus, and their leaves that nod | |
| Round thy fawnskin brush the bare | |
| Snow-soft shoulders of a god. |
