Lit., end of the century; -- mostly used adjectively in English to signify: belonging to, or characteristic of, the close of the 19th century. At that time the phrase was also intended to imply "modern" or "up-to-date;" as, fin-de-siècle ideas.

Fr.- "the end of the century"] Used in art criticism it connotes the idea of a style or movement on the decline.

French phrase meaning "end of century," sometimes used to refer to the Aesthetes or the Decadents of the late nineteenth century.

relating to or characteristic of the end of a century (especially the end of the 19th century); "fin de siecle art"

A French term meaning "end of the century." The term is used to denote the last decade of the nineteenth century, a transition period when writers and other artists abandoned old convention s and looked for new techniques and objectives. Two writers commonly associated with the fin de siecle mindset are Oscar Wilde and George Bernard Shaw. (Compare with Aestheticism and Decadents.)