clipper

From Middle Dutch klepper and Middle English clippen, from Old English clyppan, from Proto-Germanic *klupjaną.[1] [2]

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

clipper (plural clippers)

1. Anything that clips.
2. (chiefly in the plural) A tool used for clipping something, such as hair, coins, or fingernails.
3. Something that moves swiftly; especially:
   1. (nautical) Any of several forms of very fast sailing ships having a long, low hull and a sharply raked stem.
   2. (informal) An Alberta clipper.
4. (entomology) The Asian butterfly Parthenos sylvia, family Nymphalidae.
5. (electronics) A circuit which prevents the amplitude of a wave from exceeding a set value.
6. (historical) A person who mutilates coins by fraudulently paring the edges.
   • 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]:

     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.

   • 1781, Richard Brinsley Sheridan, The School for Scandal‎, London: J. Bew, act II, page 21:

     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.

   • 2010, James Morrow, The Last Witchfinder:

     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 […]

7. (slang) A confidence trickster; a conman.
   • 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 16, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:

     "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."

8. (slang, obsolete) Anything showy or first-rate.
   • 1838, Thomas Chandler Haliburton, The Clockmaker:

     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.

• Dutch: (nautical) klipper, klipperaak m or f

• Clipper chip

clipper (third-person singular simple present clippers, present participle clippering, simple past and past participle clippered)

1. (transitive) To cut or style (the hair) using clippers.
   • 2020 November 16, Dave Finlay, “Killer sliced open inmate's face while serving life for murdering dad and cutting up body”, in Glasgow Live‎:

     Rocks was having his hair clippered by another prisoner when Collins calmly walked past and sliced open the side of his face without breaking his stride.

• cripple

From English clipper.

• IPA^(key): /kli.pœʁ/

• Audio

  (file)

clipper m (plural clippers)

1. (nautical) heavy sailing ship
2. (aviation) transatlantic airplane

From clip.

• IPA^(key): /kli.pe/

clipper

1. (transitive) to clip

• Nouveau Petit Larousse illustré. Dictionnaire encyclopédique. Paris, Librairie Larousse, 1952, 146th edition

• “clipper”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.