/dip-meaning-etymology

/dip/

-) Verb.

-) Pronunciation: dɪp. 

-) Preterite tense: dipped (dɪpt), or dipt. Preterite participle: dipped.

-) Present participle: dipping.

-) Etymology: from Middle English dippen.

-) Documented since 979.

-) Transitively: -) 1. To immerse (something or someone) partially or for a little time, (for example, until it takes up a portion of the liquid); to put or let down in or into a liquid, or the vessel containing it.

-) Synonyms for “dip”: to soak, immerse, plunge.

-) Translation: tremper, in French; embeber, in Spanish; intingere, in Italian.

-) With the preposition “in”, or “into”, + noun, by which the liquid is designated:

The points of the arrows, which the Indians use in attacking their enemies, are sometimes dipped in a poisonous liquid which they extract from certain roots.

Harmon… The Interior of North America… 1820

After we had walked about three or four miles, we got sight of a bull, which we killed, and a little before night got back to the beach, as wet as if we had been dipt in water, and so fatigued that we were scarcely able to stand.

R. Kerr… A General History… 1824

Diana […] broke some bread, dipped it in milk, and put it to my lips.

Bronte… Jane Eyre… 1847

"Hold the candle," said Mr. Rochester, and I took it: he fetched a basin of water from the washstand: "Hold that," said he. I obeyed. He took the sponge, dipped it in, and moistened the corpse-like face.

Bronte… Jane Eyre… 1847

The pattern about to be engraved is painted in lines, by a small piece of stick dipped in powdered charcoal and water.

J. Polack… The New Zealanders… 1849

He took the rudder when they had pushed out into the open water, the two young men dipped their oars.

 

E. Braddon… Henry Dunbar… 1864

When they write, they hold the paper in the left hand, and grasp a small stick in the right. This stick is sharpened to a point, like a pencil, and dipped in the ink, and with it the letters are formed with considerable rapidity.

T. Knox… The oriental world… 1879

The nuts must be five times handled: first picked, then shucked, then dried, then bleached, and then again dried. After the first drying, they are dipped by basketfuls into hot water, then poured into the bleachers,--boxes with perforated bottoms.

H. Jackson… Glimpses of Three Coasts… 1886

… there she sits, placid and smiling, with her spectacles in her hand and a measure of barley on her lap, into which the little girls are dipping their chubby hands and scattering the corn amongst the ducks and chickens with unspeakable glee.

M. Mitford… Our Village… 1893

Nigel dipped his finger in his glass and, leaning over, he placed its wet impress on the Breton's hand. "This in your face!" said he.

Arthur Doyle… Sir Nigel… 1906

-) 2. To take out or extract (liquid or something immersed in it) by dipping a dipper or other receptacle into it. 

-) Sometimes with adverb “out”, or “up”.

… that the fishermen, who make holes in the ice to dip up such fish with their nets as resort thither for breathing.

R. Carew… Carew's Survey of Cornwall… 1602

… without a kettle in which to boil a potato, or a pot to dip water from the strea.

Richard Carlile… The Lion… 1828

… we had tin cups, with which, when we were thirsty, we dipped water from the springs and brooks.

The Museum of Foreign Literature… vol. 21… 1832

… the substance --of a delicate rose color, and of the consistency of cream — is dipped out with buckets, sometimes amounting to sixteen or twenty barrels.

Harper's Magazine, vol. 12… 1855

She dipped warm water out of the reservoir for him and hung a fresh towel on the nail above the washstand in the corner.

B. M. Bower… The Long Shadow… 1908

-) 3. Metaphorically: to lower (something) for an instant, as if dipping in a liquid. Particularly: -) a. To lower and raise rapidly (a flag or the like.) -) b. To dim or lower (the beam of the headlights of a vehicle).

It will be easily seen how close these vessels must lie to the wind; they do not tack, but dip the sail in wearing.

J. Seely… The Wonders of Elora… 1824

-) 4. Metaphorical slang: to rob (a person) by “dipping into” his/her pocket or purse.

I want you to tell me the truth: did you, or did you not, dip this man when he was lying on the ground?

E. Wallace… White Face… 1931

You went over and you dipped him for his clock and pack.    

E. Wallace… White Face… 1931

-) Intransitively: -) 1. To immerse oneself and rapidly emerge; to become plunged in a liquid.

-) Synonyms: to plunge, dive.

It was extremely curious and instructive to mark how they [the swimmers] dived, and dipped, and paddled in the purple pool.

Colburn's New Monthly Magazin, vol. 94… 1852

[This fish] flies nearly to the distance of a gun-shot before he touches the water; and when he has slightly dipped, in order to rest himself, mounts up again.

S. Goodrich… Tales of Animals… 1875

-) With the preposition “into”, “in”, or “under” + a noun:

… the tube, by which it is connected with the second bottle, cannot dip into the water in that bottle.

J. Murray… A System of Chemistry… 1807

… the people, as often as I dipped under water, cried out that I was searching for this metal.

H. Barth… Travels and Discoveries… 1857

-) 2. -) a. To immerse one’s hand or a receptacle into a liquid, or into a vessel, esp. for the purpose of taking something out. -) b. Metaphor: to introduce one’s hand into a receptacle, in order to take something.

I dipped into the kettle and regaled myself with its unctuous contents.

The Yale Literary Magazine, vol. 26… 1860

-) 3. Metaphor: -) a. To go down; to go a lower place; to descend into a space, as if dipping into water. -) b. To extend downwards; --without implication of motion.

The sun dipped lower toward the alabaster crests of distant mountain peaks.

R. Cullum… The Forfeit… 1917 

-) 4. Metaphor: (of a magnetic needle, strata, etc.) to be inclined to the horizon; slope downwards.

-) 5. Metaphor: (of prices, profits, etc.) to depreciate. 

-) 6. Metaphor: to dip into (a book, a subject, etc.): to treat it cursorily, without perusal or prolixity.

While he was dipping into several volumes, an Irish officer seated himself near him, and began laboriously to adjust the tie of a sword-knot.

A. Porter… The Hungarian brothers… 1807

-) Words derived from “dip”: dipped, dipper, dipperful, dipping, dippingly, dip (noun).