fonds
Pluralfonds
- 1The entire body of records originating from a single creator, kept together as a unit within an archive.
Like a complete dossier on a single source: everything from one origin gathered in one place.
The library acquired the novelist's entire fonds, including unpublished drafts and personal correspondence.
Each fonds is described as a whole before its individual files are cataloged.
Similararchive
Note
An archivist's unit of order, borrowed from French and a doublet of fund. A fonds is defined by who created it, so the papers of one novelist or one office are kept together rather than sorted by subject. This is the principle of provenance at work. The final s is not a plural marker: one fonds and several fonds are spelled alike.
- 2Plural of fond.
The rich fonds left after searing the beef formed the base of the gravy.
Cooks deglaze the pan to dissolve the fonds into the simmering liquid.
Note
The -s here belongs only to the noun fond. The adjective never takes it: one is fond of music, never fonds of it. In a kitchen, fonds are the browned residues of several pans or roasts, and in lace-making they are background designs. The same spelling also names a whole archival collection, a separate borrowing from French that is singular despite its final s.
fonds is a form of fond
fond, noun: The brown residue that forms in a pan from cooking meats and vegetables. Full entry
- Forms
- fondfonds plural
- Spelling
- fond → fonds: add -s
- Sound
- The ending sounds like /z/.
Use it in a sentence
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Origin
Borrowed from French "fonds," and a doublet of "fund."