▪ I. † knapper1 Sc. Obs. rare.
In 6 -ar.
[Jamieson suggests derivation from knape.]
‘A boor, a menial’ (Jam.).
| 1513 Douglas æneis viii. Prol. 121 Grathit lyke sum knappar [Camb. MS. gnappar]. |
▪ II. † knapper2 Obs.
[f. knap v.2 + -er1.]
One who bites abruptly, or snaps.
| 1500–20 Dunbar Poems xxvii. 10 Off seme byttaris and beist knapparis. 1611 Cotgr., Rongeur, a gnawer, knapper, nibler. |
▪ III. knapper3 dial. and local.
(ˈnæpə(r))
[f. knap v.1 + -er1.]
One who or that which ‘knaps’; one who knaps or breaks stones, flints, or the like; esp. one whose occupation is the shaping of flints by strokes of a hammer.
| 1870 Spectator 13 Aug. 976 They [flints] then pass into the hands of the ‘knapper’. His implements are a small anvil, called a ‘stake’, set obliquely..and a ‘knapping⁓hammer’ of fine steel, of which the face is set obliquely also... One smart blow strikes off the rough end, another detaches a piece of the proper size for a gun-flint. 1894 Athenæum 27 Jan. 111/1 ‘Knapping’ flints, as practised on Brandon Heath, in Suffolk, is exceedingly hard work, though there the ‘knapper’ labours for ‘his own hand’. |
b. A hammer used for shaping flints; also, Sc. a stone-breaker's hammer; a knapping-hammer.
| 1787 Shirref Jamie & Bess iv. i, A finer lad..ne'er cocked his knapper to the lift. 1882 Athenæum 16 Dec. 818/1 Palæolithic implements,..together with the flint tools, or knappers, by which they were shaped. Ibid. 818/2 Neolithic knappers were shown,..with knapping hammers of the seventeenth or eighteenth century. |
▪ IV. ˈknapper4 slang. or dial.
Also knepper, napper.
The knee.
| 1764 T. Bridges Homer Travest. (1797) I. 237 The bully on his bare Kneppers knelt down. Ibid. II. 243 On his knappers down he dropp'd. 1877 N.W. Linc. Gloss., Nappers, the knees. |