See faff in All languages combined, or Wiktionary
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"date": "19th century",
"references": []
}
],
"categories": [
"British English",
"English terms with obsolete senses",
"English terms with quotations"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
72,
77
]
],
"ref": "1900, Emma Frances Brooke, The Engrafted Rose: A Novel, page 27:",
"text": "“Shut t’ door, wilt-tu,” said Widow Goggin sharply; “thou’rt letting in faffs o’ wind. And tak’ thi shawl off.”",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"A puff of smoke; a gust of wind."
],
"links": [
[
"puff",
"puff"
],
[
"gust",
"gust"
],
[
"wind",
"wind"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(UK, obsolete) A puff of smoke; a gust of wind."
],
"tags": [
"UK",
"obsolete"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"ipa": "/fæf/"
},
{
"audio": "En-au-faff.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/4/4a/En-au-faff.ogg/En-au-faff.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/En-au-faff.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
]
},
{
"rhymes": "-æf"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"lang_code": "nl",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"neuter"
],
"word": "gedoe"
},
{
"code": "nl",
"lang": "Dutch",
"lang_code": "nl",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "soesa"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"lang_code": "fr",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "galère"
},
{
"code": "fr",
"lang": "French",
"lang_code": "fr",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "corvée"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"lang_code": "pl",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "bzdura"
},
{
"code": "pl",
"lang": "Polish",
"lang_code": "pl",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "głupota"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"lang_code": "es",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "marrón"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"lang_code": "es",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"masculine"
],
"word": "fastidio"
},
{
"code": "es",
"lang": "Spanish",
"lang_code": "es",
"sense": "an overcomplicated task",
"tags": [
"feminine"
],
"word": "lata"
}
],
"word": "faff"
}
{
"categories": [
"English countable nouns",
"English entries with incorrect language header",
"English lemmas",
"English nouns",
"English onomatopoeias",
"English verbs",
"Entries with translation boxes",
"Pages with 2 entries",
"Pages with entries",
"Requests for gender in Cimbrian entries",
"Rhymes:English/æf",
"Rhymes:English/æf/1 syllable",
"Terms with Swedish translations",
"cim:Flowers",
"cim:Lily family plants",
"cim:Occupations",
"cim:People",
"cim:Religion"
],
"derived": [
{
"word": "faff about"
},
{
"word": "faffage"
},
{
"word": "faff around"
},
{
"word": "faffer"
},
{
"word": "faffery"
},
{
"word": "faff on"
}
],
"etymology_templates": [
{
"args": {
"1": "en",
"title": "imitative"
},
"expansion": "imitative",
"name": "onom"
},
{
"args": {
"1": "conversion"
},
"expansion": "conversion",
"name": "glossary"
}
],
"etymology_text": "Originally imitative of wind or puffs of air (see verb senses \"to blow in puffs\", \"to move with a puff of air\"). The noun is formed from the verb by conversion.",
"forms": [
{
"form": "faffs",
"tags": [
"present",
"singular",
"third-person"
]
},
{
"form": "faffing",
"tags": [
"participle",
"present"
]
},
{
"form": "faffed",
"tags": [
"participle",
"past"
]
},
{
"form": "faffed",
"tags": [
"past"
]
}
],
"head_templates": [
{
"args": {},
"expansion": "faff (third-person singular simple present faffs, present participle faffing, simple past and past participle faffed)",
"name": "en-verb"
}
],
"lang": "English",
"lang_code": "en",
"pos": "verb",
"senses": [
{
"attestations": [
{
"date": "from 18th century",
"references": []
}
],
"categories": [
"English colloquialisms",
"English intransitive verbs",
"Yorkshire English"
],
"glosses": [
"To blow in puffs, blow gently."
],
"links": [
[
"blow",
"blow"
],
[
"puff",
"puff"
],
[
"gently",
"gently"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(originally Yorkshire, now colloquial, intransitive, of air) To blow in puffs, blow gently."
],
"raw_tags": [
"of air"
],
"tags": [
"colloquial",
"intransitive"
]
},
{
"attestations": [
{
"date": "from 19th century",
"references": []
}
],
"categories": [
"English terms with archaic senses",
"English terms with quotations",
"English transitive verbs",
"Yorkshire English"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
59,
64
]
],
"ref": "1949, W.J. Halliday, Arthur Stanley Umpleby, The White Rose Garland, page 104:",
"text": "Time wi’ his scythe hed mawn t’crop on his heead, An’ then fafft it away wi’ his wing.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To move (something) with a puff of air, to blow away."
],
"links": [
[
"move",
"move"
],
[
"blow",
"blow"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(originally Yorkshire, archaic, transitive) To move (something) with a puff of air, to blow away."
],
"tags": [
"archaic",
"transitive"
]
},
{
"attestations": [
{
"date": "from 19th century",
"references": []
}
],
"categories": [
"Australian English",
"British English",
"English intransitive verbs",
"English terms with quotations",
"Irish English",
"New Zealand English",
"Quotation templates to be cleaned"
],
"examples": [
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
5,
12
]
],
"ref": "2009, Steven Aitchison, 100 Ways to Develop Your Mind, page 131:",
"text": "Stop Faffing And Just Do It",
"type": "quotation"
},
{
"bold_text_offsets": [
[
79,
86
]
],
"ref": "2025 February 15, Rick Lane, “Review: Planet Coaster 2”, in PC Gamer (US), number 392, page 69; published online 1 November 2024:",
"text": "Frontier knows you're going to be spending a lot of time building coasters and faffing with scenery, so it doesn't want you fighting fires constantly.",
"type": "quotation"
}
],
"glosses": [
"To waste time on an unproductive activity."
],
"links": [
[
"waste time",
"waste time"
]
],
"raw_glosses": [
"(British, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand, intransitive) To waste time on an unproductive activity."
],
"synonyms": [
{
"word": "arse around"
},
{
"english": "American",
"translation": "American",
"word": "dick around"
}
],
"tags": [
"Australia",
"British",
"Ireland",
"New-Zealand",
"intransitive"
]
}
],
"sounds": [
{
"ipa": "/fæf/"
},
{
"audio": "En-au-faff.ogg",
"mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/4/4a/En-au-faff.ogg/En-au-faff.ogg.mp3",
"ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4a/En-au-faff.ogg",
"tags": [
"Australia"
]
},
{
"rhymes": "-æf"
}
],
"translations": [
{
"code": "sv",
"lang": "Swedish",
"lang_code": "sv",
"sense": "To waste time on an unproductive activity",
"tags": [
"dialectal"
],
"word": "fjockla"
}
],
"word": "faff"
}
Download raw JSONL data for faff meaning in English (11.0kB)
{
"called_from": "page/2530",
"msg": "skipping string in the middle of translations: </table></div></div>\n\n",
"path": [
"faff"
],
"section": "English",
"subsection": "noun",
"title": "faff",
"trace": ""
}
This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-05-17 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-05-01 using wiktextract (e973cf0 and ae80fde). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.
If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.