Fabian (n.)
"socialist," 1884, from Fabian Society, founded in Britain 1884, named for Quintus Fabius Maximus (surnamed Cunctator "the Delayer"), the cautious tactician who opposed Hannibal in the Second Punic War. The Fabians chose the name to draw a distinction between their slow-going tactics and those of anarchists and communists. The Latin gens name possibly is from faba "a bean" (see bean (n.)).