droppern.

Brit.

/ˈdrɒpə/, U.S.

/ˈdrɑpər/

Etymology: < drop v. + -er suffix¹.

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a. One who drops or lets fall in drops; in quot. 1699 = distiller (slang).

b. One who drops seeds into the holes made by a dibbler.

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the world > food and drink > farming > cultivation or tillage > sowing > [noun] > sower

seederOE

sowerc1000

seedman1569

seedsman1601

seminator1609

superseminator1642

dropper1770–4

driller1788

1699 B. E. New Dict. Canting Crew Rum-dropper, a Vintner.

1770–4 A. Hunter Georgical Ess. (1804) II. 356 An active dibbler..with three droppers at seven-pence per day.

a1774 A. Tucker Light of Nature Pursued (1777) III. iii. 285 The greatest droppers of beads were often the worst men.

1789 Trans. Soc. Arts (ed. 2) 2 45 With two dibbers and seven droppers.

c. One who passes counterfeit money, cheques, etc. (cf. drop v. 16b). slang.

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society > trade and finance > money > circulation of money > [noun] > passing of money > passing of counterfeits > person who

outera1415

outputter1574

smasher1795

shoful-pitcher1839

shofulman1851

shover1859

varnisher1864

passer1929

dropper1938

1938 F. D. Sharpe Sharpe of Flying Squad xxix. 297 These [cheques] are then passed on to other members of the gang..known as ‘droppers’. Their job is to present the cheques at the banks.

1959 ‘C. Hare’ Best Detective Stories 236 The functionary whose mission it is to put forged currency into circulation is known technically as a dropper.

d. One who delivers goods, liquor, etc., from market or store to retailers; a ‘shop-dropper’. Australian and New Zealand local and colloquial.

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1949 F. Sargeson I saw in my Dream ii. xv. 255 [The Police] reckoned they'd got her [sly-grogging] this time, because they'd found out a dropper had been through the town a few nights before on his lorry.

1957 Courier-Mail (Brisbane) 26 Nov. 2 A shop owner has only to telephone an order to a ‘dropper’ and within a few hours it is delivered to his door.

2. A dog that drops down when it sights game; a setter. Cf. drop v. 4b.

3. Angling. An artificial fly adjusted to a leader above the stretcher fly. Also dropper-fly n. at Compounds.

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the world > food and drink > hunting > fishing > fishing-tackle > means of attracting fish > [noun] > artificial fly > one of a number on line

dropper1829

bob-fly1832

dropper-fly1834

bobber1837

stretcher1837

drop-fly1870

stretcher-fly1883

tail-fly1883

1829 Bowlker's Art of Angling (new ed.) 112 The first dropper about a yard from the leading fly; the second dropper about eighteen inches above the first.

1875 ‘Stonehenge’ Man. Brit. Rural Sports (ed. 12) i. v. iv. §3. 350 If more than two droppers are used, the single gut length is increased to eight feet.

4. dropper-in n. one who drops in or pays a casual visit.

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society > leisure > social event > visit > visitor > [noun] > informal

dropper-in1805

looker-in1826

drop-in1970

1805 Ann. Rev. 3 58 The laundress is a costly dropper in.

1826 New Monthly Mag. 16 264 Endless, purposeless visitants; droppers in, as they are called.

1881 S. P. McLean Cape Cod Folks iii. 54 There was a marked and cheerful variety in the nature of the droppers-in at the Ark.

1898 E. von Arnim Elizabeth & her German Garden 37 Either you or the dropper-in will say something..better left unsaid.

1941 V. Woolf Between Acts 48 Uninvited, unexpected, droppers-in, lured off the high road.

1969 J. Cooper How to stay Married 44 The droppers-in will be so embarrassed that they'll apologise and make themselves scarce.

a. A pendant; cf. drop n. 10a.

b. A glass tube with an india-rubber top on one end, and a small opening at the other, for dropping liquid.

c. A contrivance in some reaping-machines for depositing the cut grain in gavels on the ground; also the machine itself.

d. Mining. (See quot. 1864.)

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the mind > attention and judgement > beautification > types of ornamentation > jewellery > jewellery of specific shape or form > [noun] > pendant

pendantc1400

pendicle1488

drop1502

pennon1546

pendeloque1623

bob1648

pendulea1699

pear drop1785

dropperc1825

tassel-drop1849

hanger-

c1825 Houlston Juv. Tracts No. 18 Imag. Troubles 4 She had..a ring on her finger, and long droppers in her ears.

1864 Webster's Amer. Dict. Eng. Lang. Dropper (Mining), a branch vein which drops off from, or leaves, the main lode.

1869 R. B. Smyth Gold Fields Victoria 609 Dropper, a spur dropping into the lode. A feeder.

1874 E. H. Knight Amer. Mech. Dict. I. 754/2 Simultaneously with the bringing into action of the dropper, a cut-off is brought down to arrest the falling grain till the platform is reinstated.

1886 Sci. Amer. 55 373/3 Grain..cut with a ‘dropper’ or a self-raking reaper.

1889 Internat. Ann. Anthonys Photogr. Bull. 12 The dropper is filled with alkali solution from the wide-mouthed bottle.

e. Horticulture. A young bulb of certain bulbous plants, esp. a small bulb developed at the apex of a downward shoot growing from the base of the parent bulb.

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the world > plants > part of plant > bulb > [noun] > small or secondary bulb

bulbil1884

bulblet1890

dropper1900

1900 B. D. Jackson Gloss. Bot. Terms Dropper, the young bulb of a tulip, not of flowering size.

1907 Ann. Bot. 20 429 The ‘Droppers’ of Tulipa and Erythronium.

1929 A. D. Hall Bk. Tulip 22 Occasionally also it will be noticed..that a stolon has started away from the base of the old bulb, turned downward and formed a bulb at the extremity... These bulbs are called ‘droppers’ and differ in no respect from other offsets.

1951 Dict. Gardening (Royal Hort. Soc.) IV. 2163/1 A peculiar type of natural propagation is seen in the ‘droppers’ which are sometimes formed.

f. A vertical member of a fence or the like; spec. a light lath used between the main uprights of a fence to keep the wires spaced. Chiefly Australian, New Zealand, and South African.

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?a1880 G. L. Meredith Adventuring in Maoriland (1935) vii. 68 Between the posts the wires are stapled to ‘droppers’, consisting of about three by one battens.

1904 ‘G. B. Lancaster’ Sons o' Men 93 [He] had prayed for slotted droppers [in the fence].

1950 N.Z. Jrnl. Agric. Nov. 458/3 The materials are likely to be more easily obtained than wooden droppers.

1967 Coast to Coast 1965–6 150 ‘D'you know what a Mallee gate is, Bob?’ ‘Yes, it's a short loose panel, just droppers and wires.’

Compounds

dropper-fly n. = sense 3.

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