chaps








noun (used with a plural verb)

  1. a pair of joined leather leggings, often widely flared, worn over trousers, especially by cowboys, as protection against burs, rope burns, etc., while on horseback.

verb (used with object), chapped, chap·ping.

  1. to crack, roughen, and redden (the skin): The windy, cold weather chapped her lips.
  2. to cause (the ground, wood, etc.) to split, crack, or open in clefts: The summer heat and drought chapped the riverbank.

verb (used without object), chapped, chap·ping.

  1. to become chapped.

noun

  1. a fissure or crack, especially in the skin.
  2. Scot. a knock; rap.

noun

  1. Chiefly British Informal: Older Use. a fellow; man or boy.
  2. Chiefly Midland and Southern U.S. a baby or young child.
  3. British Dialect. a customer.

noun

  1. chop3.

pl n

  1. leather overalls without a seat, worn by cowboysAlso called: chaparejos, chaparajos

verb chaps, chapping or chapped

  1. (of the skin) to make or become raw and cracked, esp by exposure to cold
  2. Scot (of a clock) to strike (the hour)
  3. Scot to knock (at a door, window, etc)

noun

  1. (usually plural) a cracked or sore patch on the skin caused by chapping
  2. Scot a knock

noun

  1. informal a man or boy; fellow

noun

  1. a less common word for chop 3
n.1

1844, American English, short for chaparejos, from Mexican Spanish chaparreras, overalls worn to protect from chaparro (see chaparral).

n.2

“jaws, cheeks,” from chap (n.), 1550s, of unknown origin. Hence, chap-fallen (1590s).

n.

1570s, “customer,” short for obsolete chapman “purchaser, trader” (see cheap). Colloquial sense of “lad, fellow” is first attested 1716 (cf. slang tough customer).

v.

“to crack,” mid-15c., chappen (intransitive) “to split, burst open;” “cause to crack” (transitive); perhaps a variant of choppen (see chop (v.), and cf. strap/strop), or related to Middle Dutch kappen “to chop, cut,” Danish kappe, Swedish kappa “to cut.” Related: Chapped; chapping. The noun meaning “fissure in the skin” is from late 14c.

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