facies

Borrowed from Latin faciēs (“form, configuration, figure; face, visage, countenance”). Doublet of face.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈfeɪ.ʃi.iːz/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈfeɪ.ʃiˌiz/, /ˈfeɪ.ʃiz/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃiiːz, -eɪʃiːz

facies (countable and uncountable, plural facies)

1. General appearance.
   • 1869, Alfred Russel Wallace, The Malay Archipelago, volume II, London: Macmillan and Co., page 106:

     The insects of these four islands have also a common facies - facts which seem to indicate that some more extensive land has recently disappeared from the area they now occupy, and has supplied them with a few of its peculiar productions.

   • 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page 6:

     The Chilean Amphijubula Schust. (Schuster, 1970a) which has the facies of a small Frullania and agrees with Frullania in leaf insertion and branching, has a nontiered seta with 16 epidermal cell rows surrounding 4 inner rows.

2. (medicine) Facial features, like an expression or complexion, typical for patients having certain diseases or conditions.

   Hyponyms: masked facies, moon facies

   costive facies

3. (geology) A body of rock with specified characteristics reflecting its formation, composition, age, and fossil content.

   Hyponyms: biofacies, lithofacies, microfacies, ichnofacies, taphofacies

• “facies”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.
• “facies”, in Merriam-Webster.com Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.

facies

1. plural of facie

• Scaife

From faciō +‎ -iēs.^[1] The term faciēs is to faciō as speciēs is to speciō, literally meaning "a make, imposed form".^[2]

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): [ˈfa.ki.eːs]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): [ˈfaː.t͡ʃi.es]

faciēs

1. second-person singular future active indicative of faciō

faciēs f (genitive faciēī); fifth declension

1. (in general) make, form, shape, figure, configuration

   Synonyms: speciēs, frōns, fōrma, habitus

   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Vergilius, Aeneis 12.891:

     verte omnes tete in facies

     resort to every expedient

     (literally, “change yourself in every shape”)

2. (usually Classical Latin) a particular face, countenance or visage
   • c. 347 CE – 420 CE, Hieronymus, Vulgate Genesis.1.2:

     Terra autem erat inānis et vacua, et tenebrae erant super faciem abyssī: et spīritus Deī ferēbātur super aquās.

     And the earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the spirit of God moved over the waters.

3. (Classical Latin, figuratively) external form, look, condition, appearance

   in faciem + (genitive) ― like, in the guise of

   1. (in particular) external appearance as opposed to reality; pretence, pretext
   2. (transferred sense, poetic) look, sight, aspect

   Synonym: speciēs

4. beauty, loveliness

   Synonyms: pulchritūdō, decus, decor

• The word for facial expression or for face as conveying a particular expression is normally vultus.

Fifth-declension noun.

• facia (late)

• “facies”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879), A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “facies”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891), An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• facies in Dizionario Latino, Olivetti
• "facies", in Charles du Fresne du Cange, Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)
• “facies”, in Gaffiot, Félix (1934), Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Walther von Wartburg (1928–2002), “facies”, in Französisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (in German), volume 3: D–F, page 355

Learned borrowing from Latin faciēs. Doublet of faz and haz.

• IPA^(key): /ˈfaθjes/ [ˈfa.θjes] (Equatorial Guinea, Spain)
• IPA^(key): /ˈfasjes/ [ˈfa.sjes] (Latin America, Philippines)
• Rhymes: -aθjes (Equatorial Guinea, Spain)
• Rhymes: -asjes (Latin America, Philippines)
• Syllabification: fa‧cies

facies f (plural facies)

1. facies

• “facies”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025