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Foul   /faʊl/   Listen
adjective
Foul  adj.  (compar. fouler; superl. foulest)  
1.
Covered with, or containing, extraneous matter which is injurious, noxious, offensive, or obstructive; filthy; dirty; not clean; polluted; nasty; defiled; as, a foul cloth; foul hands; a foul chimney; foul air; a ship's bottom is foul when overgrown with barnacles; a gun becomes foul from repeated firing; a well is foul with polluted water. "My face is foul with weeping."
2.
Scurrilous; obscene or profane; abusive; as, foul words; foul language.
3.
Hateful; detestable; shameful; odious; wretched. "The foul with Sycorax." "Who first seduced them to that foul revolt?"
4.
Loathsome; disgusting; as, a foul disease.
5.
Ugly; homely; poor. (Obs.) "Let us, like merchants, show our foulest wares."
6.
Not favorable; unpropitious; not fair or advantageous; as, a foul wind; a foul road; cloudy or rainy; stormy; not fair; said of the weather, sky, etc. "So foul a sky clears not without a storm."
7.
Not conformed to the established rules and customs of a game, conflict, test, etc.; unfair; dishonest; dishonorable; cheating; as, foul play.
8.
Having freedom of motion interfered with by collision or entanglement; entangled; opposed to clear; as, a rope or cable may get foul while paying it out.
Foul anchor. (Naut.) See under Anchor.
Foul ball (Baseball), a ball that first strikes the ground outside of the foul ball lines, or rolls outside of certain limits.
Foul ball lines (Baseball), lines from the home base, through the first and third bases, to the boundary of the field.
Foul berth (Naut.), a berth in which a ship is in danger of fouling another vesel.
Foul bill, or Foul bill of health, a certificate, duly authenticated, that a ship has come from a place where a contagious disorder prevails, or that some of the crew are infected.
Foul copy, a rough draught, with erasures and corrections; opposed to fair or clean copy. "Some writers boast of negligence, and others would be ashamed to show their foul copies."
Foul proof, an uncorrected proof; a proof containing an excessive quantity of errors.
Foul strike (Baseball), a strike by the batsman when any part of his person is outside of the lines of his position.
To fall foul, to fall out; to quarrel. (Obs.) "If they be any ways offended, they fall foul."
To fall foul of or To run foul of. See under Fall.
To make foul water, to sail in such shallow water that the ship's keel stirs the mud at the bottom.


noun
Foul  n.  A bird. (Obs.)


Foul  n.  
1.
An entanglement; a collision, as in a boat race.
2.
(Baseball) See Foul ball, under Foul, a.
3.
In various games or sports, an act done contrary to the rules; a foul stroke, hit, play, or the like.


verb
Foul  v. t.  (past & past part. fouled; pres. part. fouling)  
1.
To make filthy; to defile; to daub; to dirty; to soil; as, to foul the face or hands with mire.
2.
(Mil.) To incrust (the bore of a gun) with burnt powder in the process of firing.
3.
To cover (a ship's bottom) with anything that impered its sailing; as, a bottom fouled with barnacles.
4.
To entangle, so as to impede motion; as, to foul a rope or cable in paying it out; to come into collision with; as, one boat fouled the other in a race.


Foul  v. i.  
1.
To become clogged with burnt powder in the process of firing, as a gun.
2.
To become entagled, as ropes; to come into collision with something; as, the two boats fouled.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Foul" Quotes from Famous Books



... head,—huge, inhuman, and monstrous,—leering in bestial degradation, too foul to be either pictured or described, or to be beheld for more than an instant: yet let it be endured for that instant; for in that head is embodied the type of the evil spirit to which Venice was abandoned in the fourth period ...
— The Stones of Venice, Volume III (of 3) • John Ruskin
... many a kind turn; never an unkind one. He fought for love, not for hatred. He loved a dog—if any one kicked it, he fought him. He loved a little boy—if any one was cruel to that little boy, he fought him. He loved fair play—if any one was guilty of foul play, he fought him. When he was guilty of foul play himself (as was sometimes the case, for who is perfect?) he felt inclined to jump out of his own body and turn about and thrash himself! And he would have done so often, had it been practicable. Yes, there is no doubt whatever about ...
— The Wild Man of the West - A Tale of the Rocky Mountains • R.M. Ballantyne
... his Saviour. And yet, alas! we do not find it so. In a great many instances, the very first thing professing Christians do, is to resist and reject this doctrine of holiness as if it were the most foul ...
— Godliness • Catherine Booth
... he knows that, as long as the ship holds together, some seventy or eighty miles per day nearer home must be placed to her credit? In like manner, it is of the deepest comfort to know that, storm or calm, fair or foul, the current of time, unhasting, unresting, bears us on to the goal that we shall surely reach—the ...
— The Cruise of the Cachalot - Round the World After Sperm Whales • Frank T. Bullen
... a good book, being rich in Examples and warnings to lions high-bred, How they suffer small mongrelly curs in their kitchen, Who'll feed on them living, and foul them ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron


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