late Old English (denoting booty or spoils), from Old Norse fang 'capture, grasp'; compare with vang. A sense 'trap, snare' is recorded from the mid 16th cent.; both this and the original sense survive in Scots. The current sense (also mid 16th cent.) reflects the same notion of 'something that catches and holds'1960s: from the name of J. M. Fangio
