Faneuil Hall (fan´ū-il), a public building in Boston, famous as the place where stirring speeches were made at the outbreak of the war for American independence. It was built between 1740 and 1742 by a Huguenot merchant named Peter Faneuil.
Fanfare (Sp. fanfárria, brag), a short, lively, loud, and warlike piece of music, composed for trumpets and kettle-drums. Also small, lively pieces performed on hunting-horns, in the chase.
Fan-foot, a name given to a North African lizard of the genus Ptyodactylus (P. lobatus), one of the geckoes, much dreaded in Egypt for its supposed venomous properties.
Fanning Island, a coral island in the centre of Polynesia, lat. 3° 51' N., long. 159° 22' W. Since 1888 it belongs to Britain, is a landing-place of the Canada-Australia cable, and the stretch from this to Vancouver, 3458 miles, is the longest in the world. The island was discovered by Edmund Fanning in 1798. Area, 15 sq. miles; pop. about 200. It forms one of a small group sometimes called Fanning Islands.
Fano, a seaport of Italy, on the Adriatic, province of Pesaro e Urbino, 29 miles north-west of Ancona. It is a handsome town, and has a triumphal arch erected to Augustus, and other antiquities. Pop. (commune), 25,000.
Fan-palm, a name sometimes given to the talipot palm or Corўpha umbraculifĕra, a native of Ceylon and Malabar. See Talipot Palm.
Fans, an African race of people inhabiting the region of the west coast about the Gaboon River and the Ogoway. They are an energetic race, skilled in various arts, and are rapidly increasing in numbers (about 300,000). They are cannibals, but contact with Europeans is leading them to give up the practice.
Fanshawe, Sir Richard, an English diplomatist, poet, and translator, born in 1608, died at Madrid in 1666. He studied at Cambridge, was secretary of the English Embassy at Madrid, and took the Royal side on the outbreak of the Civil War in 1641. He was made a baronet in 1650, was taken prisoner at Worcester, but permitted to go at large on bail. After the Restoration he was employed on several diplomatic missions, and in 1664, as Ambassador at Madrid, negotiated a peace between England, Spain, and Portugal. His poetical abilities were above mediocrity, as is evinced by his translations of the Lusiads of Camoens, the Pastor Fido of Guarini, the Odes of Horace, and the fourth book of the Æneid.
