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nap

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English has three main words spelled nap: a short sleep, a native word; the raised surface of cloth, taken from Dutch or Low German; and a card game named after Napoleon.[1][2][3]

Pronunciation

nap1 short sleep

Etymology

The sleep is inherited from Middle English nappen (“to doze”), inherited from Old English hnappian (“to doze, sleep lightly”) (Mercian hneappian).[5][6][1] It is related to Old High German hnaffezan (“to doze”), which survives as dialectal German nafzen, and to Norwegian napp (“nap”).[6][7][2] The Old High German verb is an intensive formation from the same Germanic base,[8] but the further origin is unknown.[5][2][8] Weekley linked it with words for a quick closing of the eyes,[9] and Partridge thought it ultimately imitative.[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

To sleep lightly or briefly, in the Vespasian Psalter, before 830;[6][8] in earlier use it could also be figurative.[8] An Old English Gospel says of the ten virgins of Matthew 25:5 that they all "hnappudon … & slepun".[9]

Semantic evolution

Weekley notes that the word was once more dignified than it is now.[9] A Middle English psalm translation says of the keeper of Israel that he "shal not nappen ne slepen", where the King James Version has "neither slumber nor sleep".[1][11] In Middle English it could also mean "be sleepy" or "be careless".[5][8] The noun, formed from the verb, appears about 1353,[6] and take a nap about 1400.[5] The phrase to catch someone napping, to find them off guard, is recorded from before 1576.[8] Johnson (1755) defined the noun as "slumber; a short sleep".[12]

Timeline

  • before 830 – hneappian, to doze (Vespasian Psalter).[6]
  • c. 1353 – the noun nappe, a short sleep.[6]
  • a1382 – transitive, to put to sleep (obsolete).[8]
  • c. 1400 – take a nap.[5]
  • a1576 – catch napping.[8]

Modern meaning

Verb

  1. To sleep for a short time, especially during the day; doze.
  2. To be off guard or unaware of danger, especially in catch someone napping.

Noun

  1. A short sleep, especially in the daytime: a nap after lunch.

Word family

  • catnap
  • naptime

nap2 surface of cloth

Etymology

The surface of cloth is inherited from Middle English noppe, probably borrowed from Middle Dutch noppe (“tuft of wool, nap”),[6][8][5] perhaps brought in by Flemish cloth-workers.[5][9] Hoad and the Oxford Dictionary of English connect it with noppen (“to trim the nap”).[2][13] It is related to Middle Low German noppe (“tuft of wool”) and Old English hnoppian (“to pluck”).[6][5][3] The OED allows that it may instead continue the related Old English element -hnoppa.[8] The spelling nap appears in 1589, perhaps influenced by Middle French nape (“tablecloth”).[6][1]

Earliest recorded meaning

Woolly material shorn from the surface of cloth and used to stuff pillows and mattresses, 1374, in the Exchequer Rolls of Scotland; this sense was obsolete by 1780.[8] The raised layer of fibres on a fabric is recorded in 1440, in the Promptorium Parvulorum.[8][6]

Semantic evolution

From 1591, in Spenser, it described any soft, downy surface resembling the nap of cloth.[8] In the late 16th and 17th centuries it was used figuratively of wit,[8] and in American colloquial speech of the 1840s, to get one's nap up meant to lose one's temper.[8] From 1798 the word also refers to the direction in which the fibres lie.[8]

Timeline

  • 1374 – shorn woolly material used as stuffing.[8]
  • 1440 – noppe, the raised fibres on cloth.[8][6]
  • 1589 – the spelling nap.[6]
  • 1591 – a soft downy surface (Spenser).[8]
  • 1843 – get one's nap up, to lose one's temper (US).[8]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. The short raised fibres on the surface of a fabric such as velvet or corduroy.
  2. A soft, downy surface resembling this.

Word family

  • napless

nap3 card game

Etymology

The card game is a shortening of napoleon,[2][3][14][9] the name of a twenty-franc gold coin of France, after the emperor Napoleon I, and the original name of the game.[2][13]

Earliest recorded meaning

In the early 19th century it meant the coin, and by the middle of the century the card game.[14]

Semantic evolution

In the game, a player who undertakes to win all five tricks is said to go nap, earlier go the Napoleon;[2][14] figuratively, to go nap is to risk everything on one attempt.[14]

Timeline

  • early 19th century – a napoleon coin.[14]
  • mid 19th century – the card game.[14]

Modern meaning

Noun

  1. A card game in which each player is dealt five cards and bids the number of tricks they expect to win.
  2. A bid to win all five tricks in this game.

Usage notes

In Scots and in some English dialects (Cheshire, Oxfordshire, Suffolk), a nap was a wooden vessel, especially one for milk.[15] It continues the Old English word for a cup or bowl, Old English hnæp, which has a separate source.[16][8]

References

  1. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  3. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
  4. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
  5. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  6. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  7. ^ Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  8. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
  9. ^ a b c d e Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  10. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
  11. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  12. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
  13. ^ a b Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  14. ^ a b c d e f Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)
  16. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)