Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The European polecat Mustela putorius or its fur.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The polecat or foulmart, Putorius vulgaris or P. fœtidus. See polecat.
  • noun The fur of the polecat, formerly known as the fitchew, later shortened to fitch. See fitch, 2.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun obsolete polecat

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English ficheux, possibly from Walloon ficheau, diminutive of Middle Dutch vitsche, visse.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Compare Old French fisseau.

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Examples

  • To be a dog, a mule, a cat, a fitchew, a toad, a lizard, an owl, a puttock, or a herring without a roe, I would not care; but to be Menelaus!

    Act V. Scene I. Troilus and Cressida 1914

  • Cas’Tis such another fitchew! marry, a perfumed one.

    Act IV. Scene I. Othello, the Moor of Venice 1914

  • The fitchew, 22 nor the soiled23 horse, goes to ’t

    Act IV. Scene VI 1909

  • He prefers the fitchew ferret as he calls it; that is the sort that are coloured like a polecat.

    The Amateur Poacher Richard Jefferies 1867

  • The fitchew, the badger, and the hedgehog have a similarly evil reputation; but the first is rare, the second almost exterminated in many districts; the third -- the poor hedgehog -- is common, and some keepers have a bitter dislike to them.

    The Amateur Poacher Richard Jefferies 1867

  • "The fitchew nor the soiled horse goes to't with a more riotous appetite.

    Brave New World Huxley, Aldous, 1894-1963 1932

  • IV. i.150 (473,2) 'Tis such another fitchew! marry, a perfum'd one]

    Notes to Shakespeare, Volume III: The Tragedies Samuel Johnson 1746

Comments

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  • Gesundheit!

    July 20, 2021