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felon

fel·on/ˈfɛlən/adjective, noun

felon is an adjective meaning “Of a person or animal, their actions, thoughts, etc.: brutal, cruel, harsh, heartless; also, evil, wicked” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-E-L-O-N and has 2 syllables (fel·on), and it appears 1.5 times per million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does felon mean?

adjective

  1. 1

    Of a person or animal, their actions, thoughts, etc.: brutal, cruel, harsh, heartless; also, evil, wicked.

  2. 2

    Of a place: harsh, savage, wild; of a thing: deadly; harmful.

  3. 3

    obsoleterareObtained through a felony; stolen.

noun

  1. 1

    A person who has committed a felony (“a serious criminal offence”); specifically, one who has been tried and convicted of such a crime.

  2. 2

    obsoleteAn evil or wicked person.

  3. 3

    obsoleteA predatory animal regarded as cruel or wicked.

  4. 4

    A small infected sore; an abscess, a boil.

  5. 5

    A whitlow (“infection near or under a fingernail or toenail”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce felon?

  • US /ˈfɛlən/

Felon has 2 syllables, split fel·on in writing.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-felon.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of felon

  • felons plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is felon?

Felon appears 1.5 times per million words in written English, the 23,253rd most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

Felon in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

In the sense person who has committed a felony; one who has been tried and convicted of such :

LanguageWords
Frenchcriminel, criminelle, délinquant
GermanStraftäter, Straftäterin, Verbrecher, Verbrecherin, Schwerverbrecher, Schwerverbrecherin
Spanishdelincuente, criminal, felón

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does felon come from?

The adjective is derived from Middle English feloun, felun (“base, wicked; hostile; of an animal: dangerous; of words: angry, harsh, slanderous; of things: dangerous, deadly; false, fraudulent; unlucky”) [and other forms], from Old French felon (“bad, evil, immoral”) (compare fel (“evil; despicable, vile”)), from Early Medieval Latin fellōnem; further etymology uncertain. Doublet of fell (“of a strong and cruel nature; fierce; grim; ruthless, savage”). Etymology 1, adjective sense 3 (“obtained through a felony”) is derived from the noun.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).