Forms: (see UN-1 and FRIEND sb.). [ME. unfreond, -frend, = WFris. on-, ûnfrjeon, MDu. onvrient (Du. -vriend), MLG. unvrund, MHG. unvriunt (G. unfreund).]
1. One who is not a friend or on friendly terms; an enemy. In early use chiefly Sc. (sometimes in predicate without article), and in the 19th cent. app. revived by Scott.
c. 1275. Lay., 5632. We sollen … slean houre onfrendes and wenden after Brenne. Ibid., 17612. Wend to oure onfreondes and drif heom of londe.
c. 1425. Wyntoun, Cron., VIII. xxvi. 3890. For he doutit þe gret mycht Off his vnfreyndis, and þare slycht.
a. 1475. Ashby, Dicta Philos., 885. Showe to al maner freindis grete honnour … And pardon freendes & vnfreendes errour.
1581. Mulcaster, Positions, xxxix. (1887), 213. Socrates … uniustely condemned by the furie of the people, and persuasion of his vnfreindes.
1600. W. Watson, Decacordon (1602), 125. Some night Crowes, or other vnfriends or backe friends that may be set on to incense against him.
1663. Lauderdale Papers (Camden), I. 127. His unfriends here had taken pains to procure … copies of the books.
1814. Scott, Wav., xv. He is a very unquiet neighbour to his un-friends.
1835. Gen. P. Thompson, Exerc. (1842), III. 158. With this reservation, there must be no unfriends.
1877. Stubbs, Med. & Mod. Hist. (1886), 110. I am ready to stick to my friends and vote against my un-friends.
b. Const. of, to.
1513. Douglas, Æneid, IX. vi. 111. The day lycht, quhilk is to ws onfrend, Approchis neyr.
c. 1600. W. Fowler, Wks. (S.T.S.), I. 241/30. Thow, o atropos, vnfreind to hir, and to to freind to me.
1626. in Rushw., Hist. Coll. (1659), I. 253. That one near the Crown of England should … become an unfriend to our State.
1692. Scotch Presbyterian Eloquence (1738), 47. This Way will render us more formidable to our Enemies, and Unfriends to our Way.
1819. Scott, Leg. Montrose, vi. They are but unfriends to each other.
1888. Spectator, 22 Dec., 1804. Mr. Courtney, certainly no unfriend of the Parnellites.
2. One who is not a member of the Society of Friends. Also attrib.
1828. Southey, Ep. to A. Cunningham, 387. From such a barber, O unfriend Darton! was that portrait made.
1846. W. E. Forster, in T. W. Reid, Life (1888), I. 186. To make their movement a national one by adding the names of unfriend ladies to their committee.
