fast
Meanings
- Firmly or securely fixed in place; stable.
- Firm against attack; fortified by nature or art; impregnable; strong.
- Steadfast, with unwavering feeling. (Now mostly in set phrases like fast friend(s).)
- Moving with great speed, or capable of doing so; swift, rapid; light.
- Having a kinetic energy between 1 million and 20 million electron volts; often used to describe the energy state of free neutrons at the moment of their release by a nuclear fission or nuclear fusion reaction (i.e., before the neutrons have been slowed down by anything).
- Of a place, characterised by business, hustle and bustle, etc.
- Causing unusual rapidity of play or action.
- Able to transfer data in a short period of time.
- Deep or sound (of sleep); fast asleep (of people).
- Not running or fading when subjected to detrimental conditions such as wetness or intense light; permanent.
- Tenacious; retentive.
- Having an extravagant lifestyle or immoral habits.
- A train that calls at only some stations it passes between its origin and destination, typically just the principal stations.
- Ellipsis of stand fast, a warning not to pass between the arrow and the target.
- In a firm or secure manner, securely; in such a way as not to be moved; safe, sound .
- Deeply or soundly .
- Immediately following in place or time; close, very near .
- Quickly, with great speed; within a short time .
- Ahead of the correct time or schedule.
- To practice religious abstinence, especially from food.
- To reduce or limit one's nutrition intake for medical or health reasons, to diet.
- To cause (a person or animal) to abstain, especially from eating.
- The act or practice of fasting, religious abstinence from food.
- Any of the fasting periods in the liturgical year.
- Acronym of focused assessment with sonography for trauma.
- Acronym of firefighter assist and search team.
- Acronym of free advertising-supported streaming television
- Acronym of facial drooping, arm weakness, speech difficulty, time, a mnemonic for diagnosing a CVA or stroke.
- Initialism of Five-hundred-meter Aperture Spherical Telescope.
- An acronym for remembering desirable characteristics for goal-setting: frequently discussed, ambitious, specific, transparent.
- A surname.
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *fastuz Proto-West Germanic *fast Old English fæst Middle English fast English fast From Middle English fast, fest, from Old English fæst (“firm, secure”), from Proto-West Germanic *fast, from Proto-Germanic *fastuz; see it for cognates and further etymology. The development of “rapid” from an original sense of “secure” apparently happened first in the adverb and then transferred to the adjective; compare hard in expressions like “to run hard”. The original sense of “secure, firm” is now slightly archaic, but retained in the related fasten (“make secure”). Also compare close meaning change from Latin rapiō (“to snatch”) to Latin rapidus (“rapid, quick”), from Irish sciob (“to snatch”) to Irish sciobtha (“quick”).