fetish Look up fetish at Dictionary.com
1610s, fatisso, from Port. fetiço "charm, sorcery," originally feitiço "made artfully, artificial," from L. facticius "made by art," from facere "to make" (see factitious). L. facticius in Sp. has become hechizo "magic, witchcraft, sorcery." Probably introduced by Port. sailors and traders as a name for charms and talismans worshipped by the inhabitants of the Guinea coast of Africa. Popularized in anthropology by C. de Brosses' Le Culte des Dieux Fétiches (1760), which influenced the word's spelling in English (Fr. fétiche, also from the Port. word). Figurative sense of "something irrationally revered" is Amer.Eng. 1837. For sexual sense, see fetishism.