fringe

Etymology

From Middle English frenge, from Old French frenge, from Vulgar Latin *frimbia, a metathesis of Latin fimbriae (“fibers, threads, fringe”, plural), of uncertain origin. Compare German Franse and Danish frynse. Eclipsed native Middle English fnæd (“fringe”), Middle English byrd (“fringe”), Middle English fasel (“fringe”) from Old English fæs (“fringe”), and Old English fnæs (“fringe”). Doublet of fimbria.

noun

1. A decorative border.
   the fringe of a picture
2. A marginal or peripheral part.
   Dos Santos, who has often been on the fringes at Spurs since moving from Barcelona, whipped in a fantastic cross that Pavlyuchenko emphatically headed home for his first goal of the season. September 29, 2011, Jon Smith, “Tottenham 3 - 1 Shamrock Rovers”, in BBC Sport
3. Those members of a political party, or any social group, holding unorthodox views.
4. The periphery of a town or city (or other area).
   He lives on the fringe of London.
   Moreover, although a number of lines penetrate to the fringes of the English Lake District, this is the only one which actually passes through it. 1961 October, ""Voyageur"", “The Cockermouth, Keswick & Penrith Railway”, in Trains Illustrated, page 598
5. (UK) Synonym of bangs: hair hanging over the forehead, especially a hairstyle where it is cut straight across.
   Her fringe is so long it covers her eyes.
   Fayne in the photograph had a fringe, hair frizzed over hidden ears, sleeves over-ornate, the whole thing out of keeping. 1981, Hilda Doolittle, HERmione, page 155
   Ingeborg knew she wasn′t ready for fringes or short hair like some of the women she′d seen, and she hoped her daughter wasn′t either. “No.” Astrid′s tone dismissed Sophie and the fringe as she galloped off to a new topic. 2007, Lauraine Snelling, Sophie's Dilemma, page 16
   Set against the seductive visual and textual imagery of these soft-focus fantasy worlds, the stock list details offer the reader a very real solution to achieving the look themselves, ‘Hair, including coloured fringes (obtainable from Joseph, £3.50) by Paul Nix’ (Baker 1972a: 68). 2009, Geraldine Biddle-Perry, Sarah Cheang, Hair: Styling, Culture and Fashion, page 231
6. (physics) A light or dark band formed by the diffraction of light.
   interference fringe
7. Non-mainstream theatre.
   The Fringe; Edinburgh Fringe; Adelaide Fringe
8. (botany) The peristome or fringe-like appendage of the capsules of most mosses.
9. (golf) The area around the green
10. (Australia) Used attributively with reference to Aboriginal people living on the edge of towns etc.
    All the fringe people thought it was such a good house, ingenious in fact, and erected similar makeshift housing for themselves. 2006, Alexis Wright, Carpentaria, Giramondo, published 2012, page 20
11. (television, radio) A daypart that precedes or follows prime time.

adj

1. Outside the mainstream.
   So was the cellist Charlotte Moorman, muse to Nam June Paik and proactivist champion of all things fringe. Sept. 7, 2015, Holland Cotter, “Exhibitions Where Moral Force Trumps Market Forces”, in New York Times

verb

1. (transitive) To decorate with fringe.
2. (transitive) To serve as a fringe.
   Purple bonnets fringed soft, pink, querulous faces on pillows in bath chairs. 1922, Virginia Woolf, chapter 2, in Jacob's Room