foxing

1. 1
   noununcountable

   Brownish-yellow spotting and discoloration that develops on old paper, books, or prints as they age.

   The appraiser noted heavy foxing on the title page of the first edition.

   Humidity in the storage room accelerated the foxing throughout the entire collection.

   Similarspotting, discoloration, mottling

   Note

   A condition word from printing and the book trade, where foxing is described by how heavy it is and where it sits. As a mass noun it names the overall spotting, and as a count noun, foxings, it names separate patches. The trade also calls it measles or mealiness. The spots themselves are fox marks, blamed on humidity, which is why damp storage is the usual culprit.

2. 2
   verb

   Present participle of fox.

   The cryptic final clue was foxing even the most experienced solvers.

   Her unpredictable strategy kept foxing the opposing team all afternoon.

   Note

   The -ing form carries every sense of the verb, so it can mean outwitting, baffling, acting slyly, or the dated sense of cheating. Most often it takes a person as object: a clue foxing the solvers. Intransitively it can describe paper discoloring, the root of the brown spotting on old pages, and a rarer transitive use means souring beer by fermentation.

3. 3
   noununcountable

   A strip of material running around a shoe's lower edge that bonds the upper to the sole.

   The classic sneaker's rubber foxing wraps neatly around the toe.

   Repairing the worn foxing restored the boot's tight seal.

4. 4
   noununcountable

   Cunning, crafty behavior aimed at outwitting or deceiving others through trickery rather than honesty.

   The negotiation was full of foxing on both sides of the table.

   His reputation for foxing made rivals wary of every deal he proposed.

   Similartrickery, cunning, guile, deception, chicanery

   Oppositehonesty, candor

   Note

   Often heard as a reproach rather than a description. In Arthur Conan Doyle, Silas shakes a sleeping boy and snaps "None of your foxin'!", suspecting the sleep is put on. That scene shows how near this general craftiness sits to the trick of feigned sleep. "None of your foxing" works much like "none of your tricks".

5. 5
   nounslanguncountable

   The act of feigning sleep or unconsciousness while actually being awake and aware.

   The boxer accused his opponent of foxing after the controversial knockdown.

   She realized he had been foxing the whole time, listening to every word.

   Similarfaking, pretending

   Note

   Born in prison slang, where lying still and passing for asleep or knocked out can be a small deception of its own. It still belongs to talk and fiction rather than careful prose. In formal writing, feigning sleep or shamming unconsciousness says the same thing without the cant, and it avoids any confusion with the general sense of craftiness.

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