clipper
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Forms: form: clippers
Etymology: From Middle English clipper, equivalent to clip (“cut, shorten”) + -er (suffix forming agent nouns). The type of sailing ship is probably also from clip, in the sense of “move or run rapidly”. Perhaps influenced by Middle Dutch klepper (“swift horse”), from kleppen (“to clap”), which is onomatopoeic.
Senses: examples: text: Yes, perhaps I’d better begin there, at the moment when I […] asked a question carelessly enough of one of the locals, who was clipping a hedge in a desultory fashion nearby. […] When I passed my hedge clipper again, he said, […]
ref: 1967, Agatha Christie, chapter 1, in Endless Night, New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, published 1968, →LCCN, book 1, pages 2 and 5:
glosses: Anything or anyone that clips.
glosses: A tool used for clipping something, such as hair, coins, or fingernails.
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: Something that moves swiftly; especially:
Any of several forms of very fast sailing ships having a long, low hull and a sharply raked stem.
glosses: Something that moves swiftly; especially:
An Alberta clipper.
topics: biology
entomology
natural-sciences
glosses: An Asian butterfly of species Parthenos sylvia, family Nymphalidae.
topics: business
electrical-engineering
electricity
electromagnetism
electronics
energy
engineering
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
physics
glosses: A circuit which prevents the amplitude of a wave from exceeding a set value.
examples: text: Indeed, the French may lay twenty French crowns to one, they will beat us; for they bear them on their shoulders: but it is no English treason to cut French crowns, and to-morrow the king himself will be a clipper.
ref: 1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Henry the Fift”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene i]:
text: Many a wretch who has been drawn upon a hurdle, has done less mischief than those barterers of forged lies, coiners of scandal, and clippers of reputation.
ref: 1781, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal, London: J. Bew, act II, page 21:
text: Surtouts billowing in an unseasonably fierce wind, the ursine Chelmsford magistrate and his equally bulky constable herded their bound prisoners – three murderers, three thieves, a coin clipper, two convicted witches – across the Common […]
ref: 2010, James Morrow, The Last Witchfinder:
glosses: A person who mutilates coins by fraudulently paring the edges.
examples: text: "You have head enough for both of us, Beck," said he. "You're sure to get us out of the scrape. I never saw your equal, and I've met with some clippers in my time too."
ref: 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 16, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:
glosses: A confidence trickster; a conman.
examples: text: Well, he was courtin' Sister Sall. She was a real handsum looking gal; […] a real clipper, and as full of fun and frolic as a kitten.
ref: 1838, Thomas Chandler Haliburton, The Clockmaker:
glosses: Anything showy or first-rate.
Derived terms: Alberta clipper
Baltimore clipper
Canadian clipper
clipper system
Colorado clipper
nail clipper
tea clipper