Etymologically
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crop

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /kɹɒp/ (UK); /kɹɑp/ (US)[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Old English cropp (“head or top of a herb; bird's craw”),[2][3][4] cognate with Old High German kropf (“swelling on a bird's throat, craw”) and Old Norse kroppr, body.[3][2][5] The common notion is a protuberance.[3]

Earliest recorded meaning

The rounded head of a herb or flower: about 700 in Barnhart and the OED.[2][6] A bird's craw is from about 1000.[2][6]

Semantic evolution

The OED notes that Old English had only the senses bird's craw and head of a herb, and that the further senses top and produce of the field are exclusively English.[3][7] The produce of cultivated plants, especially a year's grain yield, is from the early 14th century, probably via the verb cut off the top of a plant (about 1200).[3][8] From top came the upper part of a whip, its handle (1560s), and a hunting whip (1857).[3] Anything gathered when ready is from the 1570s, and a short head of hair from 1795.[3] Crop up, to appear unexpectedly, is from 1844, from an earlier mining use of strata coming to the surface (1660s).[3]

Timeline

  • c. 700 – the head of a herb.[2][6]
  • c. 1000 – a bird's craw.[6]
  • c. 1200 – to cut off the top (verb).[3]
  • early 14th century – a harvest.[3]
  • 1795 – a short haircut.[3]
  • 1844 – crop up.[3]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A plant grown for food, especially a cereal or vegetable, or the yield of it in a season.
  2. A group or quantity appearing at one time: this year's crop of students.
  3. A pouch in a bird's gullet where food is stored before digestion.
  4. A very short haircut.
  5. A short whip used in riding.

Verb

  1. To cut very short; to cut off the edges of a picture.
  2. Of animals, to bite off the tops of plants.
  3. (crop up) To appear or happen unexpectedly.

Word family

  • cropless
  • cropper
  • outcrop
  • sharecrop
  • sharecropper
  • crop-dusting
  • stonecrop
  • cropland

References

  1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  2. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  5. ^ Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  6. ^ a b c d Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Pearsall, Judy, ed. (1998), The New Oxford Dictionary of English, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  8. ^ Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press