c1330 R. Mannyng Chron. Wace (Rolls) 7547 Preyenge..Þat he wolde..herberwe him wyþ, A day to ete a sop, & drynke, & se his werk.

c1400 (?c1390) Sir Gawain & Green Knight (1940) l. 1135 Þe leue lorde..Ete a sop hastyly, when he hade herde masse.

c1400 Laud Troy Bk. 7932 Than thei ȝede and toke a sop, Thei ete a sop, and afftir dranke.

c1440 Gesta Romanorum (Harl.) xii. 39 If þat ȝe woll voche-safe to take a soppe with me.

c1386 G. Chaucer Merch. T. 631 Thanne he taketh a sope in fyne clarree.

c1386 G. Chaucer Prol. (Harl.) 334 Wel loved he in the morn a sop of [v.r. in] wyn.

a1450 Knt. de la Tour (1868) 28 She made euery day dresse..for hem disshes withe soppes of mylke.

1493 Chastysing Goddes Chyldern (de Worde) iv. sig. Av/1 Hit is nede that he take a soppe in ale or in wine before mete.

c1515 Ld. Berners tr. Bk. Duke Huon of Burdeux (1882–7) xiv. 38 They toke a soppe of wyne.

a1533 Ld. Berners tr. Arthur of Brytayn (?1560) lxxix. sig. Uiiii Suche as wold toke a sop in wine.

1606 J. Sylvester tr. G. de S. Du Bartas Deuine Weekes & Wks. (new ed.) ii. iii. 85 Preferring farr, Red-Herrings, Rashers, and (some) sops in Tarr.

1832 W. Stephenson Coll. Local Poems, Songs, &c. 95 When at the fire they're roasting, We're all to have sops in the grease.

a1625 J. Fletcher Pilgrim iii. vii, in F. Beaumont & J. Fletcher Comedies & Trag. (1647) sig. Hhhhh^v/1 Your [sic] shall have no more sops ith' pan else, nor no poridge.

1786 A. M. Bennett Juvenile Indiscretions I. 61 A plate of toast and grease, vulgarly called sop in the pan.

1814 W. Scott Waverley II. ii. 27 This he considered as a mere sop in the pan to stay the appetite of Edward's curiosity. View more context for this quotation

1845 W. Youatt Dog ii. 36 Milk at first, and afterwards milk and sop alternately, may be used.

1892 P. H. Emerson Son of Fens xxxii. 334 ‘What are you going to ha' for breakfast this morning?’ mother ax him. ‘A baisin of sop.’

1377 W. Langland Piers Plowman B. xiii. 124 [He] hath..sette alle sciences at a soppe saue loue one.

a1529 J. Skelton Magnyfycence (?1530) sig. Gii Tushe these maters y^t ye moue are but soppys in ale.

a1505 R. Henryson Test. Cresseid 407 in Poems (1981) 124 O sop of sorrow, sonken into cair! O catiue Creisseid!

1575 J. Rolland Treat. Court Venus ii. f. 19^v Thair was the sop of science I suppois: Thair was the flour of fairheid [etc.].

1608 W. Shakespeare King Lear vii. 29 For though it be night the Moone shines, ile make a sop of the moone-shine a you. View more context for this quotation

1637 J. Fletcher & P. Massinger Elder Brother iv. i. sig. F4^v Ye have no more spirit than three sleepy sops.

1859 J. C. Hotten Dict. Slang 58 Sop, a soft or foolish man.

1597 W. Shakespeare Richard III i. iv. 154 1 Chop him in the malmsey But in the next roome. 2 Oh excellent deuice, make a sop of him.

1609 W. Shakespeare Troilus & Cressida i. iii. 113 The bounded waters Should..make a sop of all this solid globe. View more context for this quotation

a1774 A. Tucker Light of Nature Pursued (1777) III. iii. 139 Away he goes to make..a sop in the briny broth of Ocean.

1665 R. Howard Committee iv. i, in Four New Plays Do you want some Fees? I'le perish in a dungeon before I'le consume with throwing Sops to such Curs.

1725 J. Swift Let. to Worrall 27 Aug. in Wks. (1766) XI. 221 I had lately a letter without a name, telling me, that I have got a sop to hold my tongue.

1845 Parl. Deb. 3rd Ser. 79 820 This Bill..[is] a sop given to the priests.

1873 H. Spencer Study Sociol. xi. 288 I do not want these sops and gratuities.

1894 Times (Weekly ed.) 31 Aug. 691/3 This lavish expenditure..is intended as a sop to the disaffected.

1700 Rector's Bk. Clayworth (1910) 132 Jan. 20^th, a great sop of wett on y^e ground.

1856 N. Hawthorne Jrnl. 10 May in Eng. Notebks. (1997) II. iv. 14 A great puddle and sop of blood.

1729 Dulcinead 5 One rainy Day t' avoid a Sop, In Church young J——s his Head did pop.

1513 G. Douglas tr. Virgil Æneid i. vi. 176 Venus with ane sop of mist baith tway, And with ane dirk clud closit round about.

1513 G. Douglas tr. Virgil Æneid v. xii. 5 Thai..gan behald The fyre sparkis wp fleand thik fald In a blak sop of reik.

1828 W. Carr Dial. Craven (ed. 2) Sops, small, detached clouds hanging on the sides of a mountain, which prognosticate rain.

1866 E. Lynn Linton Lizzie Lorton I. xii.

1682 T. D'Urfey Butler's Ghost 141 Like Country Vicar,..at a Wedding, or a Fair, Is sooner sopt than any there.

1683 J. Moxon Mech. Exercises II. Dict. 391 When a Press-man has taken too much Inck, he is said to Sop the Balls.

1725 R. Bradley Chomel's Dictionaire Œconomique at June The Water is to be supply'd as you find convenient, and no longer, lest it sop your Stem too much.

1788 W. Marshall Rural Econ. Yorks. I. 310 The covering moist and feeble, and the sod sopt with wet, fall heavy and flat to the ground.

1820 J. Clare Poems Rural Life (ed. 3) 127 The dews, brush'd off from grass and flowers, Bemoistening sop his harden'd shoes.

1850 R. W. Emerson Montaigne in Representative Men iv. 176 We have been sopped and drugged with the air, with food [etc.].

1853 C. Dickens Bleak House ii. 6 An arch of the bridge in the park has been sapped and sopped away.

1888 S. O. Addy Gloss. Words Sheffield 229 Come sop up that gravy.

1914 J. Galsworthy Let. in Times 28 Feb. 5/3 The admission or rejection of Tariff Reform, the Disestablishment or preservation of the Welsh Church, I would almost say than the granting or non-granting of Home Rule—questions that sop up ad infinitum the energies, the interest, the time of those we elect and pay to manage our business.

a1922 T. S. Eliot Waste Land Drafts (1971) 5 Blew in to the Opera Exchange, Sopped up some gin.

1951 D. Riesman Individualism Reconsidered in A. W. Loos Religious Faith & World Culture 73 The everpresent threat of war..used as a rationalization to sop up our ‘excessive’ comforts.

1962 S. Carpenter in J. Glenn et al. Into Orbit 57 The nose [of the capsule] would sop up much of the friction we were running into and would become quite warm.

1973 J. G. Farrell Siege of Krishnapur ii. 25 The ladies discovered that while sitting in the boat the hems of their dresses had sopped up a certain amount of bilge water.

1977 A. Carter Passion of New Eve x. 158 I sopped up the sauce from the beans with a hunk of bread.

1831 Miss Mitford in The Remembrance 40 Strawberries lay sopping in their beds.

1844 C. Dickens Martin Chuzzlewit xlvii. 541 Sopping and soaking in among the leaves that formed its pillow; oozing down into the boggy ground,..went a dark, dark stain.

1894 ‘T. Cobbleigh’ Sam & Sabina i The water just sops through the turf.

1755 T. Smollett tr. M. de Cervantes Don Quixote I. iv. x. 292 His necessity is not so great, but that he eats..tho' he may feed upon the leavings of the rich, or..go a sopping, as they term it.

1837 T. Carlyle French Revol. II. v. v. 309 Danton and needy corruptible Patriots are sopped with presents of cash.