fang n.

also *pak-, Proto-Indo-European root meaning "to fasten."

It forms all or part of: Areopagus; appease; appeasement; compact (adj.) "concentrated;" compact (n.1) "agreement;" fang; impact; impale; impinge; newfangled; pace (prep.) "with the leave of;" pacific; pacify; pact; pagan; page (n.1) "sheet of paper;" pageant; pale (n.) "limit, boundary, restriction;" palette; palisade; patio; pawl; pax; pay; peace; peasant; pectin; peel (n.2) "shovel-shaped instrument;" pole (n.1) "stake;" propagate; propagation; travail; travel.

It is the hypothetical source of/evidence for its existence is provided by: Sanskrit pasa- "cord, rope," pajra- "solid, firm;" Avestan pas- "to fetter;" Greek pegnynai "to fix, make firm, fast or solid," pagos "pinnacle, cliff, rocky hill;" Latin pangere "to fix, to fasten," pagina "column," pagus "district;" Slavonic paž "wooden partition;" Old English fegan "to join," fon "to catch seize."

"A fly ball hit to a player during fielding practice in which the batter (often a coach) tosses the ball into the air and hits it as it descends with a long and narrow bat." [Paul Dickson, "The Dickson Baseball Dictionary," 3rd ed., 2009], attested from 1867 (fungoes), baseball slang, of unknown origin; see Dickson's book for a listing of the guesses. Perhaps from a Scottish fung "to pitch, toss, fling;" perhaps from some dialectal fonge "catch," a relic of Old English fon "seize" (see fang), or possibly from the German cognate fangen. Not in OED 2nd ed. (1989). There does not seem to have been a noun phrase (a) fun go in use at the time. It formally resembles the Spanish and Italian words for "fungus."

late 15c., "addicted to novelty," literally "ready to grasp at all new things," from adjective newefangel "fond of novelty" (mid-13c., neufangel), from new + -fangel "inclined to take," from Proto-Germanic *fanglon "to grasp," from nasalized form of PIE root *pag- "to fasten" (compare fang). Sense of "lately come into fashion" is recorded from 1530s. Fanglement "act of fashioning; something made" is from 1660s; neue-fangelnesse "fondness for novelty" is from late 14c. Middle English had gar-fangel "fish-spear."