fantasy

Noun

Middle English fantasie, fantsy, fansey "the imagination as a faculty, mental image produced by this faculty, deluded notion, figment of the imagination, preference directed by caprice rather than reason, liking," borrowed from Anglo-French fantasie "imagination as a faculty, figment of the imagination, dizziness," borrowed from Late Latin phantasia "imagination as a faculty, mental image of something perceived physically, image evoked by a poet or orator, a thing imagined by someone sleeping or ill, delusion," going back to Latin, "imagined situation or experience," borrowed from Greek phantasía "appearance, presentation to consciousness (whether immediate or in memory), image, imagination as a faculty, imagery," noun derivative corresponding to phantázein "to make visible, present to the eye or mind, (middle voice) place before one's mind, picture to oneself, imagine," causative verb from phantós "visible," verbal adjective of phaínō, phaínein (active voice) "to bring to light, cause to appear," and phaínomai, phaínesthai (middle voice) "to become visible, come to light, appear," going back to *phan-i̯e/o-, thematized from Indo-European *b^h-né-h₂-/b^h-n̥-h₂- (whence also Armenian banam "(I) open, reveal"), nasal present from *b^heh₂- "shine, give light, appear," whence Sanskrit bhā́ti "(it) shines, beams," Avestan fra-uuāiti "(it) beams forth"; the verb is allied to nominal derivatives in -n-, as Germanic *bōnjan- (whence Old English bōn "ornament," gebōned "ornamented," Middle Dutch boenen "to scrub, polish"), Old Irish bán "white, fair, bright," Tocharian B peñiyo "splendor," Sanskrit bhānú- "light, beam, brilliance, appearance," Avestan bānu- "beam of light"

Note: Compare fancy entry 2, in Middle English a rare variant of fantasie; the two split from each other in early Modern English, so that fancy entry 2 and fantasy now differ in meaning and construction. In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries a not infrequent sense, usually with the spelling phantasy, was "the formation of images or representations in direct perception or in memory," more or less following the Greek meaning. — Regarding the relation of *b^heh₂- "shine, give light, appear" to the homonymous base *b^heh₂- "speak, say," see the note at ban entry 1.

Adjective

from attributive use of fantasy entry 1

Verb

Middle English fantasien, fantesien, fancyen "to plan, devise, create, form (an idea), imagine (something false), desire" — more at fancy entry 1

Note: The word was originally a variant of fancy entry 1, which, together with the more recent derivative fantasize, has in large part supplanted it.