wiper

Etymology

It is formed from English wipe + -er.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} The verb is Middle English wipen, from Old English wīpian (“to wipe, cleanse”),^[3][6][7] which is cognate with Old High German wīfan (“to swing, wind round”), Danish vippe and Dutch vippen (“to swing”).^[6][3][2] Klein and Etymonline trace it to a root meaning "to move to and fro, to turn", Proto-Indo-European *weip-, which Klein also sees in Latin vibrō (“to shake”).^[6][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

A person who wipes, especially a workman employed to wipe or dry something: 1552, in Huloet's Abcedarium Anglico Latinum.^[2][8][3] Dictionary.com dates it 1545–50.^[5]

Semantic evolution

From 1587 a wiper was also a cloth or other thing used for wiping,^[2][3] and in slang a handkerchief: Ben Jonson's Masque of Owls (1624) has "wipers for their noses",^[9][10] and Green's Dictionary of Slang follows the word through Grose's dictionaries of the 1780s to the 1890s, when a cotton handkerchief was a wiper and a silk one was not.^[9] Johnson (1755) defined it as "an instrument or person by which any thing is wiped".^[10] Another slang line, from 1622, applied it to weapons, later to a thug, and in American underworld use from 1934 to a gunman;^[2][4][9] from 1846 it was also a severe blow or a cutting retort.^[2][9] Technical senses followed: a cam or tappet in machinery (1796),^[2][11] a rod for cleaning the bore of a gun (1826),^[2][8] and a moving electrical contact in telephone exchanges (1906).^[2][4] Since 1929 the word has above all been short for a windscreen wiper or windshield wiper,^[2][3][4] also in compounds such as wiper blade.^[2][4]

Timeline

• 1552 – a person who wipes, a workman who wipes things clean or dry.^[2][8]
• 1587 – a cloth or other thing used for wiping.^[2] Etymonline dates this sense to the 1580s.^[3]
• 1622 – slang, a weapon.^[2]
• 1624 – slang, a handkerchief.^[9]
• 1796 – a cam or tappet in machinery.^[2]
• 1826 – a rod for wiping out the barrel of a gun.^[2]
• 1846 – slang, a severe blow or a sharp retort.^[2]
• 1906 – a moving contact arm in a telephone switch.^[2]
• 1929 – a windscreen wiper.^[2][3]
• 1934 – American underworld slang, a gunman.^[9]

Meanings

Noun

1. A person who wipes something, especially a worker employed to wipe things clean or dry.^[8][2][4]
2. A cloth, towel, sponge or the like used for wiping.^[12][8][2]
3. A windscreen wiper or windshield wiper: The wipers squeaked across the dry glass.^{[12][2][4][13]}
4. In machinery, a cam or tappet that lifts a part and lets it fall under its own weight, as in a stamping mill.^[12][8][11]
5. (electrical engineering) A moving contact arm that sweeps over a row or ring of terminals, as in a switching device.^[12][8][4]
6. A rod for cleaning the bore of a firearm.^[8][2]
7. (slang, now rare) A handkerchief.^[8][4][9]
8. (slang) A gunman or hired killer.^[4][9]
9. (slang) A severe blow or a sharp retort.^[2][9]

Word family

• windshield wiper

Related words

• wipe
• whip
• vibrate

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
6. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
7. ^ Bosworth, Joseph; Toller, T. Northcote (1898), An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press; Toller, T. Northcote (1921), Supplement
8. ^ a b c d e f g h i Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com
10. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
11. ^ a b Smyth, W. H. (1867), The Sailor's Word-Book: An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, London: Blackie and Son
12. ^ a b c d Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
13. ^ Deverson, Tony; Kennedy, Graeme, eds. (2005), The New Zealand Oxford Dictionary, Auckland: Oxford University Press