▪ I. ˈdripping, vbl. n.
[f. drip v. + -ing.]
1. The fall of liquid in drops; concr. the liquid so falling.
| c 1440 Promp. Parv. 132/2 Dryppynge, or droppynge, stillacio. a 1635 Corbet On J. Dawson, Butler Ch. Ch. (R.), O ye barrels! let your drippings fall In trickling streams. a 1816 Bp. Watson Anecd. I. 121 (R.) The scanty drippings of the most barren rocks in Switzerland. |
2. spec. The melted fat that drips from roasting meat, which when cold is used like butter. Formerly often in
pl.| 1463 [implied in dripping-pan.] 1530 Palsgr. 215/1 Drepyng of rost meate, la gresse du rost. 1552 Huloet, Drippinges of rost. 1601 Holland Pliny II. 385 The dripping or grauie that commeth from a rams lights rosted. 1723 Swift Poems Wks. 1763 II. 141 For Candles she trucks her Dripping. 1826 Scott Let. to Lockhart 15 Jan., A good sirloin, which requires only to be basted with its own drippings. 1887 R. N. Carey Uncle Max viii. 67 A piece of bread and dripping. |
† 3. A slope to carry off water.
Cf. drip n. 7.
| 1613–39 I. Jones in Leoni Palladio's Archit. (1742) I. 71 The Dripping of the Pavement. 1740 Dyche & Pardon, Dripping..the inclination or angular slant of a pent house. |
4. attrib. and
Comb., as
dripping-board, a board from which water drips;
dripping-cake, a cake made with dripping;
dripping crust, a pastry crust made with dripping;
dripping toast, toast spread with dripping;
dripping-vat (see
quot.). Also
dripping-pan.
| 1865 I. T. F. Turner Slate Quarries 16 The slab, on which, from a ‘*dripping-board’, a continuous dropping of water washes particles of flint sand beneath the saw-plate. |
| 1857 Hughes Tom Brown ii. viii, The excellence of that mysterious condiment, a *dripping-cake. |
| 1747 H. Glasse Art Cookery viii. 75 A *Dripping Crust... Beef-dripping..work it up well into..Flour. 1906 Mrs. Beeton Bk. Household Managem. xxxi. 883 Dripping crust (for plain pies and puddings). |
| 1921 W. de la Mare Crossings 14 Maybe you'll come and have a bit of *dripping toast to your tea. |
| 1874 Knight Dict. Mech., *Dripping-vat, a tank beneath a boiler..to catch the overflow or drip, as..in indigo-factories. |
▪ II. ˈdripping, ppl. a. [f. drip v. + -ing2.] 1. That drips; having liquid falling off in drops.
| 1783 Cowper Rose 10 A nosegay, so dripping and drowned. 1801 Southey Thalaba xi. xxxvi, His back and dripping wings Half open'd to the wind. 1833 H. Martineau Cinnamon & P. vi. 109 The other girls wrung out their dripping hair. |
b. Of weather: Wet, continuously rainy.
| 1699 Poor Man's Plea 7 They had a dripping Harvest. 1792 Trans. Soc. Arts X. 99 In any dripping year, you will not fail of two hundred bushels to an acre. 1894 Mrs. H. Ward Marcella III. 250 A dripping September day. |
c. dripping eaves. (See
quot.)
| 1847 Craig, Dripping-eaves, the lower edges of the roof of a building from which the rain drips to the ground. 1849 Freeman Archit. 189 The towers sometimes have octagonal spires of wood with dripping eaves. |
2. quasi-adv. in
phr. dripping wet.
| 1840 Marryat Olla Podr., S.W. by W., The master..came down dripping wet. |