faint [ME] The word faint is related to feign [ME], both coming from French faindre and initially used in the original French sense of ‘feigned, simulated’, from Latin fingere ‘to form, contrive’ also the source of fiction [LME] and figment [LME]. Another early meaning was ‘cowardly’, a sense now preserved only in the proverb faint heart never won fair lady [M16th]. The sense ‘hardly perceptible’ dates from the mid 17th century.Feint [L17th] originally used in fencing for a deceptive blow is from the same source, while the mid 19th-century use of feint for lightly lined paper is simply a respelling of faint.