neapn.2
/niːp/, U.S. /nip/ Now U.S. regional (rare).† 2. English regional (northern). A wooden rest for the shaft of a loaded cart. Obsolete.
1. The pole or tongue of a cart. In later use U.S. regional (chiefly New England). Now rare.
ΘΚΠ
society > travel > means of travel > a conveyance > vehicle > cart, carriage, or wagon > parts of cart or carriage > [noun] > shaft(s) or pole
thillc1325
limber1480
sway1535
neap1553
draught-tree1580
wain-beam1589
beam1600
fills1609
spire1609
foreteam?1611
verge1611
shaft1613
rangy1657
pole1683
thrill1688
trill1688
rod1695
range1702
neb1710
sharp1733
tram1766
carriage pole1767
sill1787
tongue1792
nib1808
dissel-boom1822
tongue-tree1829
reach1869
wain-stang1876
1553 Inventory in Midland Counties Hist. Collector (1855) I. 233 Itm iij waynes, iij dongcarts..iij nepe yoks.
1659 C. Hoole tr. J. A. Comenius Visible World (1672) 173 The parts of a Wagon are, the Neep (or draught-tree) [etc.].
1772 in Amer. Speech (1947) 22 31 1 band for cart nep.
1877 C. D. Warner Being a Boy i When I rode on the neap of the cart, and drove the oxen.
1884 Harper's Mag. Sept. 613/1 They had..perched themselves on a cart neap.
1951 N.Y. Folklore Q. 7 190 The St. Lawrence Valley has neap for the wagon tongue.
1971 G. R. Wood Vocab. Change 51 The shaft between two horses hitched to a farm wagon is called a tongue... Neap, neb, and spear occur in a few instances.
ΘΚΠ
society > travel > means of travel > a conveyance > vehicle > cart, carriage, or wagon > parts of cart or carriage > [noun] > rest to support shaft
neap1691
1691 J. Ray N. Country Words in Coll. Eng. Words (ed. 2) 51 A Nape or Neap; a piece of Wood, that hath two or three feet, with which they bear up the fore-part of a laded Wain.
1787 F. Grose Provinc. Gloss. Nape, or Nepe, a piece of wood that hath three feet, used to support the fore part of a loaded waggon.
1876 C. C. Robinson Gloss. Words Dial. Mid-Yorks. 89 Neap,..a three-legged rest, constructed of natural branches, and used to support the shaft of a vehicle.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
neapadj.n.1
/niːp/, U.S. /nip/ A. adj.
Designating or relating to a tide occurring just after the first or third quarters of the moon, when the high-water level is lowest and there is least difference between high- and low-water levels; opposed to spring tide n. 2. Formerly also, †of a point in time: coinciding with a neap tide (obsolete). Also figurative.Originally in †neap-flood. Later usually in neap tide.Neap tides arise when the earth–moon line is at 90 degrees to the earth–sun line (i.e. the moon is in quadrature), so that there is no reinforcement of the gravitational pull of the moon by that of the sun. The actual time of the neap tide is delayed by frictional effects and the rotation of the earth.
ΘΚΠ
the world > the earth > water > flow or flowing > tide > type of tide > [noun] > neap
neap-floodeOE
neapc1487
eOE Corpus Gloss. (1890) 6/1 Ledo, nepflod.
OE Old Eng. Martyrol. (Julius) 20 Mar. 36 Fylleþflod bið nemned ond on Læden malina, & se nepflod ledo.
OE Antwerp Gloss. (1955) 233 Ledona, nepflod uel ebba.
1479 in J. T. Smith & L. T. Smith Eng. Gilds (1870) 425 That they leue resonable stuff upon the bak fro spryng to spryng, to serue the pouere people..in the neep sesons.
1548 Hall's Vnion: Henry VIII f. cxxxj Thre horsemen..whiche wel knewe the hauen of Calice, came at a nepe tide.
1561 R. Eden tr. M. Cortés Arte Nauigation ii. xviii. sig. G.ii Whiche the Mariners call nepe tydes, lowe ebbes, lowe waters, dead waters, or lowe fluddes.
1622 R. Hawkins Observ. Voiage South Sea xliiii. 104 Our Shippe..in the neape streames, comming a-ground in the sterne.
a1644 F. Quarles Solomons Recantation (1645) Sol. xii. 65 When ebbing bloods neap tides shall strike thy lims With trembling Palsies.
1694 London Gaz. No. 3025/3 The great Ships..wanted Water to come over the Flatts..by reason of the Neep Tides.
1720 J. Strype Stow's Surv. of London (rev. ed.) I. i. vi. 32/2 The Tydes were then at the neapest.
1794 R. J. Sulivan View of Nature I. 390 The spring tides will be greater..and the neap tides on that account will be less.
1860 All Year Round 18 Aug. 449 The tides are weak, or neap; the oscillation of the sea is less.
1884 Ld. Tennyson Queen Mary (new ed.) i. v. 39 The realm is poor, The exchequer at neap-tide [1875 neap-ebb].
1888 Encycl. Brit. XXIII. 369/2 The height between high-water mark at neap tide and mean low-water mark at spring tide is called the neap rise.
1922 J. Joyce Ulysses iii. xvii. [Ithaca] 624 What in water did Bloom,..admire?.. Its hydrostatic quiescence in calm: its hydrokinetic turgidity in neap and spring tides.
1956 J. Barth Floating Opera vi. 58 They put a crabberman's thirst on you, such that all the water in a deep neap tide can't quench.
1998 Motor Boat & Yachting Jan. 41/3 You need to be there at the top of a neap tide to avoid constantly having to adjust your mooring ropes.
B. n.1
A neap tide.dead neap: see dead adj. 27.
ΘΚΠ
the world > the earth > water > flow or flowing > tide > type of tide > [noun] > neap
neap-floodeOE
neapc1487
c1487 J. Skelton tr. Diodorus Siculus Bibliotheca Historica i. 59 Thenne thus it fortuneth by Nilus that in wynter season it is a lowe & base water, and a nepe consumed by hete of the ground.
1584 in J. J. Cartwright Chapters Hist. Yorks. (1872) 268 We say that there ryseth at the sprynge 18 foott water, and at the nepe eleaven foot water.
1660 J. Childrey Britannia Baconica 91 So do the Neaps too after the Quarters.
1679 W. Salmon Horæ Mathematicæ iv. xvii. 405 The Neaps and lowest Tides at her..quarters.
1727–38 E. Chambers Cycl. (at cited word) The lowest of the neap is four days before the full or change—on which occasion the seamen say, that it is deep neep.
1777 Philos. Trans. 1776 (Royal Soc.) 66 448 During the neep, the tide was very inconsiderable.
1849 H. Miller Foot-prints of Creator 241 A zone still less deeply covered by water, and which even the lower neaps expose.
1875 F. G. D. Bedford Sailor's Pocket Bk. (ed. 2) v. 146 For both springs and neaps give the height of high water.
1962 ‘C. S. Forester’ Hornblower & Hotspur xv. 215 The last of the flood, two days after the lowest neaps, and wind north by east.
1984 Pract. Boat Owner Feb. 56/1 At neaps, yachts of moderate draught can remain afloat.
1991 P. O'Brian Nutmeg of Consol. (1993) i. 10 The reef..now white with the broken water of a neap at three-quarter ebb.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2003; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
neapv.
/niːp/, U.S. /nip/ 1. † b. transitive. To cause (a ship) to be kept aground, in harbour, etc., by a neap tide. Obsolete. rare.
a. transitive. In passive. Of a ship: to be kept aground, in harbour, etc., by a neap tide. Also occasionally intransitive in the same sense.
ΘΚΠ
society > travel > travel by water > grounding of vessel > be aground [verb (intransitive)] > go aground > accidentally > be left aground by tide
neap1513
1513 in J. B. Paul Accts. Treasurer Scotl. (1902) IV. 474 To lois the said schip quhen scho was nepit in the New Havin.
1560 in A. J. Warden Dundee Burgh Laws (1872) 21 It is statut..that na ship niep..betwixt the shoar and bulwark for stopping of the entrie of uther shipes.
1655 E. Robinson Disc. Warr Lancs. (1864) 72 Vessels..lying at anchor whether neeped or no.
1704 J. Harris Lexicon Technicum I. at Neipe When a Ship wants Water, so that she cannot get out of a Harbour, off from the Ground, or out of the Dock, the Seamen say she is Neiped.
1709 S. Sewall Diary 18 Nov. (1973) II. 628 The Ship was on the Ground, and [Capt. Teat] fear'd he should be nip'd.
1769 W. Falconer Universal Dict. Marine Neaped, the situation of a ship which is left aground on the heighth of a spring-tide.
1835 J. Ross Narr. Second Voy. North-west Passage xxxiii. 467 The tides were now diminishing, while we could not run the risk of being neaped in this manner.
1865 Pall Mall Gaz. 21 Nov. 6 Owing to a sudden change in the river.., the Mooltan is neaped, and cannot leave here until the 14th inst.
1891 Law Times 90 248/2 Inasmuch as she could load ‘always afloat’ in the dock, she was not entitled to leave it in order to avoid being neaped.
1915 Morning Post 21 May 5/1 A French cruiser was in a neighbouring dry dock... Two hours overtime would have enabled her to have been out of dry dock before being neaped.
1986 Cruising July 15/1 There may well be more water than charted when you enter, but a change of wind could leave you neaped.
ΘΚΠ
society > travel > travel by water > grounding of vessel > be aground (by so much) [verb (transitive)] > cause to run aground > accidentally > strand by tide
neap1770
1770 in J. Hawkesworth Acct. Voy. (1773) III. 559 I hauled her bow close ashore; but kept her stern afloat, because I was afraid of neiping her.
a. intransitive. Of the sea, a tide, etc.: to become lower at each high tide, to pass from spring tide to neap tide. Also in passive. Obsolete.
ΘΚΠ
the world > the earth > water > flow or flowing > tide > type of tide > types of tide [verb (intransitive)] > neap
neap?a1563
?a1563 W. Baldwin Beware Cat (1584) iii. sig. Diii v It is not the Moon that causeth the Sea to eb and flowe, neither to nepe and spring.
1652 P. Heylyn Cosmographie Introd. sig. Dv From the first quarter to the full it [sc. the sea] is said to spring: from the full to the last quarter it is said to nepe.
1823 S. L. Fairfield Poems 93 The drowsy watch was called to tread The deck, and slow I left my bed, And then the tide was neaping.
1854 G. B. Richardson Univ. Code (ed. 12) v. 3270 The tides are neaped.
1866 Evening Star 24 Mar. The tides are now neaping.
b. intransitive. Of a tide: to reach the point when high tide is lowest. Obsolete. rare.
ΘΚΠ
the world > the earth > water > flow or flowing > tide > type of tide > types of tide [verb (intransitive)] > reach highest point of
neap1807
1807 Ann. Reg. 1805 (Otridge ed.) Chron. 410/2 At 40 minutes past 2 the tide had neaped and fell above 3 inches.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2003; most recently modified version published online June 2022).
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n.21553
adj.n.1eOE
v.1513