nipper en · NOUN
Pronunciation
- (Australia) audio
- /ˈnɪpə(ɹ)/
Etymology
Etymology tree English nip Proto-Indo-European *-yósder. Proto-Italic *-āzios Latin -āriusnom. Latin -āriusbor. Proto-Germanic *-ārijaz Proto-West Germanic *-ārī Old English -ere Middle English -ere English -er English nipper From nip + -er.
Meanings
-
One who, or that which, nips.
Watt saw the little movements of the stuff, the little bulgings and crumplings, and the sudden indrawings, where it was nipped, between forefinger and thumb probably, for those are the nippers.
1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, [Paris]: Olympia Press, →OCLC:
- (plural-normally) Any of various devices (as pincers) for nipping.
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(UK, informal) A child.
No, this is not a creche: nippers should not be running around, fighting under the pool table or generally creating havoc (this applies to dogs, too).
2018 June 6, Tony Naylor, “The new rules of pub etiquette: don't flirt with bar staff or steal the glasses”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:Heard what I was saying, and nipped off to the patrols the very next day. Pretty smart for a nipper of seven, eh?
1949 June 8, George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel, London: Secker & Warburg, →OCLC; republished [Australia]: Project Gutenberg of Australia, August 2001, part 1, page 55:
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(Australia) A child aged from 5 to 13 in the Australian surf life-saving clubs.
It is the first day of training for a group of ten ‘little nippers’ (novice surf life-savers). An assortment of children expectantly hover in the clubhouse.
2008, Tania Cassidy, Robyn L. Jones, Paul Potrac, Understanding Sports Coaching: The Social, Cultural and Pedagogical Foundations of Coaching Practice:Within weeks across Australia, weekends at beaches will soon be dominated by junior lifesavers – known as “nippers” – swimming and board-riding along thousands of kilometres of coastline.
2025 September 6, Ben Doherty, “‘Every surfer feeling this’: tight-knit community mourns fatal shark attack on Sydney’s northern beaches”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:Of our movement’s 153,000 members, over 58,500 are nippers (5-13 years). This equates to nearly 40% of our total membership and shows just how significant the junior movement is within surf lifesaving.
2013 September 5, Eve Jeffery, “Nippers season begins on the north coast”, in Echonetdaily:SLSA has become a multi-million dollar enterprise comprising 262 clubs located around the Australian coastline, with 100000 members, which included thousands of juniors or ‘nippers’, as they were more commonly known.
2003, Some Like It Hot: The Beach As a Cultural Dimension:The Nippers program, for children aged five to thirteen, promotes water safety skills and confidence in a safe beach environment
2011 October 6, “Nipper numbers exceed 60,000”, in Australian for life, archived from the original on 21 Mar 2012:Every club around Australia offers a Nippers programme. Nippers is open to children from the age of 5 through to 13 years old […]
2009, Didgeridoos and Didgeridon'ts: A Brit 's Guide to Moving Your Life Down Under:
- (historical) A boy working as a navvies' assistant.
- (Canada, Newfoundland, slang) A mosquito.
- (archaic) One of four foreteeth in a horse.
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(obsolete) A satirist.
[…] ready backbiters, sore nippers, and spiteful reporters privily of good men.
a. 1569 (date written), Roger Ascham, edited by Margaret Ascham, The Scholemaster: Or Plaine and Perfite Way of Teaching Children, to Vnderstand, Write, and Speake, the Latin Tong, […], London: […] John Daye, […], published 1570, →OCLC:
- (obsolete, slang) A pickpocket; a young or petty thief.
- A fish, the cunner.
- (archaic) A European crab (Polybius henslowii).
- The claws of a crab or lobster.
- A young bluefish.
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(dated) A machine used by a ticket inspector to stamp passengers' tickets.
The railway ticket nipper has the identification number of the conductor on it […]
1908, Transport World, volume 24, page 319:
- One of a pair of automatically locking handcuffs.
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(historical) One of the gloves or mittens worn by fishermen to protect their hands from cold and abrasion.
Today, there are new synthetic materials to protect the hands, but until recently, fishermen wore nippers—thick rubber gloves with cotton lining.
1997, Mark Kurlansky, Cod, page 112:Suddenly the line flashed through his hand, stinging even through the "nippers," the woolen circlets supposed to protect it.
1897, Rudyard Kipling, Captains Courageous:
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| nippers | Number=Plur | lexicographic |
Deriveds
Synonyms
pickpocketer · dipper · gonoph · nipper · pickpurse · pickpocket · dip · foist · nip · cutpurse · footpad · prig
Translations (8)
cs klouček (slang term for a small child) · ru карапуз (slang term for a small child) · it pinza (slang term for a small child) · cs prcek (slang term for a small child) · pl berbeć (slang term for a small child) · mi karekata (slang term for a small child) · es mico (slang term for a small child) · cs špunt (slang term for a small child)