festn.
/fɛst/, U.S. /fɛst/ Chiefly colloquial.
A festival. Also: an informal event or occasion featuring an abundance of a specified activity or thing. Frequently with modifying word.bitch-, blood-, film fest, etc.: see the first element. See also beerfest n., nostalgia-fest n., talkfest n., etc.
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > social event > festive occasion > [noun] > day or season of
high tideOE
high dayOE
feast dayc1300
ferie1377
festival day1389
feastful day1440
festivala1500
gaudy-day1567
carnival1598
utas1600
saturnal1605
Saturnalia1639
terminals1656
days of gala1716
fête dayc1759
mirth-day1778
season1791
festa1800
jour de fête1806
fiesta1844
fest1846
Winterval1982
1846 H. Grote Let. 18 June in T. H. Lewin Lewin Lett. (1909) II. 40 The weather had already annulled my project of going over to Aix to hear Jenny Lind, as I feared the broil and clatter of a ‘fest’ in a crowded foreign town.
1873 Era 31 Aug. 10/4 The annual Sangerfest of Switzerland took place this year at Lucerne... The first singing fest at Lucerne took place in 1842.
1924 P. Marks Plastic Age xxiv. 286 The monthly meetings were nothing but ‘bull fests’.
1952 M. Steen Phoenix Rising iv. 86 Some kind of a liquor-fest in an off-colour bar.
1963 M. McCarthy Group i. 23 She..loved..a good hen fest.
1989 Japan Times 16 May 4/2 The director of The British Council in Kyoto, which provided strong support to the festival, envisioned the fest as ‘a major cultural event’.
2005 Chicago Tribune 6 Mar. (Midwest ed.) viii. 4 Doors open at 5:30 p.m. at the County Fairgrounds for Wisconsin's oldest jazz fest.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2021; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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n.1846