Noun: farewell
| Singular | farewell |
| Plural | farewells |
Sample Sentences
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He bid farewell to all of his fans.
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The departure was not unduly prolonged.[…]Within the door Mrs. Spoker hastily imparted to Mrs. Love a few final sentiments on the subject of Divine Intention in the disposition of buckets; farewells and last commiserations; a deep, guttural instigation to the horse; and the wheels of the waggonette crunched heavily away into obscurity. [1921, Ben Travers, chapter 5, in A Cuckoo in the Nest, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 1925, →OCLC:]
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The last train—a three-coach A.E.C. unit—from Belfast to Crumlin and back, was bade farewell with fog signals as it carried a capacity crowd of last-trip travellers. [1960 November, L. Hyland, “The Irish Scene”, in Trains Illustrated, page 691:]
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See how the morning opes her golden gates, And takes her farewell of the glorious sun. [c. 1591–1592 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Third Part of Henry the Sixt, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene i]:]
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Before I take my farewell of the subject. [September 14, 1710, Joseph Addison, The Examiner No. 1]
Nouns inflected like farewell
soldier's woundwort,
Nicosian,
whopper,
greypate,
tactile sign language,
chronotrope,
Rosie Lee,
dissentient,
photoinactivator,
sulphonediimine,
coastal waterfall,
residuary devise,
bituminization,
nitrosonaphthol,
smṛiti,
geosphere,
backscreen,
mensuralist,
flocculate,
flocculant, etc. (List truncated at 20 nouns)
Etymology
1. From Middle English farewel, from fare wel! (and the variants with the personal pronoun "fare ye well" and "fare you well" used in the Renaissance), an imperative expression, possibly further derived from Old English *far wel!, equivalent to fare (“to fare, travel, journey”) + well. Compare Scots farewele, fairweill (“farewell”), Saterland Frisian Foarwäil (“farewell”), West Frisian farwol (“farewell”), German Fahrwol, Fahrwohl,
2. East Frisian forwal,
3. Dutch vaarwel (“farewell (sadly)”), Danish farvel (“farewell”), Norwegian farvel (“farewell”), Swedish farväl (“farewell”), Faroese farvæl (“goodbye”), Icelandic far vel (“farewell”). The extensive list of cognates suggests a postulated ultimate Proto-Germanic phrase of origin, possibly something akin to *far wela. See: Middle English Nouns '
farewel', Dutch Nouns '
vaarwel', Danish Nouns '
farvel', Swedish Nouns '
farväl'.
Verbs referencing "farewell"
Swedish Nouns
farväl.