reap
/riːp
/verb [with object]
1Cut or gather (a crop or harvest): many men were employed to reap the harvest figurative in terms of science, the Apollo programme reaped a meagre harvest...
- She lived and worked with a family of peasants, cultivating the field, planting crops, reaping the harvest.
- With it, farmers could retain their soil and still reap a crop.
- Last year, while fellow sweet-cherry growers were reeling from the financial blow of low yields, Kendell was reaping an impressive harvest.
1.1Harvest the crop from (a piece of land): farmers agreed to continue reaping the land by traditional means...
- It was replaced with a more local, romantic Palestinian nationalism - familiar to Europeans - that reveres the peasant and the shepherd and dreams of reaping the land.
- The cornfields are almost all reaped.
- As gameplay progresses, you'll place your cities, have your population grow, build wonders, armies, reap the land and generally just try to survive.
Synonyms
harvest, garner, gather in, bring in, take in;
cut, crop
1.2Receive (something, especially something beneficial) as a consequence of one’s own or another’s actions: the company is poised to reap the benefits of this investment...
- As a visiting scientist in the United States she reaped the data harvest from a new generation of seismic observatories, installed during the Cold War to monitor underground nuclear explosions.
- At the end of fiscal 2002, when banks had reaped a bumper harvest through treasury profits, it was widely seen as a one-time affair and not expected to be repeated this year.
- On top of that, the United States reaped a great harvest of German ideas about aerial technology with its foresighted Operation Paperclip at the end of the war.
Synonyms
receive, obtain, get, acquire, secure, bring in, realize, derive, procure
Phrases
reap the harvest (or fruits) of
you reap what you sow
Origin
Old English ripan, reopan, of unknown origin.
Reap is something of a mystery. We do not know its origin, and it has no matching words in related languages. A person who seems unwilling to face up to the consequences of their actions may be told that you reap what you sow. This proverbial saying goes back to a verse in the biblical Epistle to the Galatians: ‘Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.’ See also grim