Forms: 5–7 foyle, 6–7 foile, 7 Sc. foillie, 6– foil. [f. FOIL v.1 4.]
† 1. Wrestling. The fact of being almost thrown; a throw not resulting in a flat fall; also in phrase to give (a person) the foil. Obs. Cf. FALL sb. 13.
1553. [see FALL sb. 13].
1567. Trial Treasure, B ij.
| Luste. Of mine honestie my company he utterly refused, | |
| And in wrestling with me he gaue me the foyle, | |
| Saying that I had myselfe and other abused, | |
| Leading men in perplexitie and marveilous toile. |
1622. Breton, Strange Newes (Grosart), 6/1. Exercises they haue many, but chiefly wrestling, when they haue more foiles then faire falls.
1687. Answ. to Representer’s 8th Ch., 4. Two Foils makes a Fall.
1706. Phillips (ed. Kersey), Foil, a Fall in Wrestling, that is not clearly given.
1721–90. in Bailey.
2. A repulse, defeat in an onset or enterprise; a baffling check. arch. † In early use often in phrases: to give a or the foil; to have, receive, take a (the, one’s) foil; to put to (a, the) foil.
c. 1478. in Eng. Gilds, 304. Standinge upon theire reputation, and myndynge not to take the foyle, stande to meaneteane and defende theyre cause.
1548. Udall, etc., Erasm. Par., Pref. 11. Could neuer yet fynde how to geue him any foile, or how to take thaduantage of any such holde against him, whereby to confound his doctrine.
1573. G. Harvey, Letter-bk. (Camden), 13. Requestid him most ernestly that he wuld not kepe me back ani lenger, considering what a foul shame and foil it had alreddi bene unto me.
1603. Holland, Plutarch’s Mor., 427. Chabrias the captaine of the Athenians having put to foile and defaited some few Thebans about Corinth (who for heat of fight had run disbanded and out of aray) made a bravado.
1609. Hume, Admon., in Wodr. Soc. Misc. (1844), 582. And receaved the foillie, althoght they wer fortifeit for a tyme by the grytest of the land.
1615. G. Sandys, Trav., III. 145. Their troublesome reignes, high valours, the alternate changes of foiles and victories (their foes at hand, their succours afarre off) and finally their finall ouer-throw procured by home-bred treason, require a peculiar History.
1647. N. Bacon, Discourse of the Laws & Government of England, I. lxiv. (1682), 132. The Lords received the first blow, and gave the first foil.
a. 1716. South, Serm. (1744), XI. 24. It may give a man many a wound, many a foil and many a disheartening blow: for, believe it, the strong man will fight for his possession.
1738. trans. Johnson’s ad Urbanum, in Gentl. Mag., May.
| Hail Urban! indefatigable man, | |
| Unwearied yet by all thy useful toil! | |
| Whom num’rous slanderers assault in vain; | |
| Whom no base calumny can put to foil. |
1814. Southey, Roderick, XVIII. 357.
| Thou too, Salado, on that later day | |
| When Africa received her final foil, | |
| And thy swoln stream incarnadined, rolled back | |
| The invaders to the deep. |
1821. Joanna Baillie, Met. Leg., Wallace, lv.
| Edward, meantime, ashamed and wroth | |
| At such unseemly foil and loth. |
1870. Morris, Earthly Par., III. IV. 232.
| He thinks | |
| No more of yesterday’s disgrace and foil, | |
| No more he thinks of all the sickening toil | |
| Of piling straw on straw to reach the sky. |
† b. With mixture of the sense of FOIL v.1 6: A disgrace, stigma. Obs.
1599. Porter, Angry Wom. Abingt. (Percy Soc.), 26.
| Indeed, I sawe a fault in thee myselfe, | |
| And it hath set a foyle vpon thy fame. |
1616. Breton, Good & Badde, 5/2. He [an Vnworthy King] is the foyle of a crowne, the disgrace of a Court, the trouble of a Councell, and the plague of a Kingdome.
† 3. The cause of (one’s) defeat or failure. Obs.
a. 1683. Oldham, Ode to Vice, Poet. Wks. (1686), 106.
| And thou, yet greater Faux, the glory of our Isle, | |
| Whom baffled Hell esteems its greatest Foyl. |
a. 1704. T. Brown, Sat. agst. Woman, Wks. 1730, I. 55.
| Oh! gawdy source of all mens hopes and fears, | |
| Foil of their youth, and scandal of their years. |
