Fines

How to spell fines

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce fines

What does fines mean?

1. nounSums of money charged as penalties for breaking a rule or law.
2. verbCharges someone a sum of money as a penalty for an offence.

Fines in a sentence

• noun

  The council issued parking fines to drivers who overstayed.

• verb

  The court routinely fines motorists who exceed the speed limit.

• noun

  Unpaid library fines can add up over several months.

• verb

  The league fines any club that fields an ineligible player.

Where does fines come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin finis, which literally meant 'end' or 'boundary', the same root that gives us 'finish', 'final', and 'finite'. In medieval law a 'fine' was originally a final agreement or settlement that brought a dispute to an end, often sealed by a payment to the court, and English borrowed it through Old French fin during the 1200s. Because that settling payment so often took the form of money handed over to close a matter, the sense narrowed over time to mean a sum charged as a penalty. The verb sense, to impose such a charge, grew naturally out of the noun. The connection to finis is worth remembering when spelling it: the word keeps the simple 'fin' of 'finish' and adds a silent 'e', then an 's' for the plural or the verb.

How the word is built

• fine (from Latin finis: end, settlement)
• -s (plural or third-person verb ending)