damper
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: enpr: dămp′ər
ipa: /ˈdæmpɚ/
rhymes: -æmpə(ɹ)
Forms: form: dampers
Etymology: From damp (verb) + -er.
The name of the type of bread is first attested in 1825, and originally likely refers to damping the appetite.
Senses: glosses: Something that damps or checks:
A valve or movable plate in the flue or other part of a stove, furnace, etc., used to check or regulate the draught of air.
glosses: Something that damps or checks:
A contrivance (sordine), as in a pianoforte, to deaden vibrations; or, as in other pieces of mechanism, to check some action at a particular time.
examples: text: Nor did Sabrina′s presence seem to act as any damper at the modest little festivities.
ref: 1887, William Black, Sabina Zembra:
glosses: Something that damps or checks:
Something that kills the mood.
glosses: Something that damps or checks:
A device that decreases the oscillations of a system.
examples: text: In general, steel springs were stipulated for primary suspension, although rubber was accepted for auxiliary springing; hydraulic dampers were specified and the use of laminated springs ruled out.
ref: 1960 December, “The first hundred 25 kV a.c. electric locomotives for B.R.”, in Trains Illustrated, page 726:
text: However, complaints quickly surfaced about the ride quality of the SIG BT41 bogies, which was only cured by the fitting of additional dampers to the bogies and couplers.
ref: 2022 September 21, Ben Jones, “IC225s: the Electras go gliding on”, in RAIL, number 966, page 40:
topics: engineering
mechanical
mechanical-engineering
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
glosses: Something that damps or checks:
A shock absorber.
examples: text: 1827, Peter Cunningham, Two Years in New South Wales, ii.190, quoted in G. A. Wilkes, A Dictionary of Australian Colloquialisms, 1978, →ISBN,
The farm-men usually bake their flour into flat cakes, which they call dampers, and cook these in the ashes.
text: The flour bespattering Squeaker's now neglected clothes spoke eloquently of his clumsy efforts at damper making.
ref: 1902, Barbara Baynton, edited by Sally Krimmer and Alan Lawson, Bush Studies (Portable Australian Authors: Barbara Baynton), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, published 1980, page 15:
text: You hypocritically claim that you are trying to ‘protect’ us; but your modern policy of ‘protection’ (so-called) is killing us off just as surely as the pioneer policy of giving us poisoned damper and shooting us down like dingoes!
ref: 1938, William Ferguson, John Patten, “Aborigines Claim Citizen Rights!”, in Anita Heiss, Peter Minter, editors, Macquarie PEN Anthology of Aboriginal Literature, Allen & Unwin, published 2008, page 31:
glosses: Bread made from a basic recipe of flour, water, milk, and salt, but without yeast.
examples: text: A certain class of 'City Arabs' do nothing but steal provisions from shop doors and sell them for one-tenth of their value, or less, […] while a fourth again do nothing but "draw the dampers," i. e. steal from shop-tills.
ref: 1853, Joseph Kay, The Condition and Education of Poor Children in English and in German Towns, page 20:
glosses: A shop till.
Derived terms: damperless
damper winding
fire damper
overdamper
put a damper on
seismic damper
tuned mass damper
underdamper
viscous damper
yaw damper