▪ I. chopping, vbl. n.1
(ˈtʃɒpɪŋ)
[f. chop v.1]
1. a. The action of chop v.1, in various senses.
| 1377 Langl. P. Pl. B. ix. 167 Many a peire..In ialousye ioyeles and ianglyng on bedde Haue þei no children but cheste and choppyng hem bitwene. 1577 Holinshed Descr. Brit. i. xi. (R.) The sensible chopping in of three or foure tides in one naturall daie. 1669 Worlidge Syst. Agric. vii. (1681) 123 Clay well tempered with Horse-dung to keep the same from chopping. 1725 De Foe Voy. round World (1840) 323 Chopping of blocks. |
b. with adverb.
| 1548 Udall, etc. Erasm. Par. Acts 46 a, In chopping of Iohns head. 1577 tr. Bullinger's Decades (1592) 233 An adulteresse, at the chopping off of whose head seuen strokes were giuen. 1618 Bolton Florus iii. iv. 677 Nothing so terrifide the barbarous, as the chopping off their hands. |
† 2. A result or product of chopping. Obs.
| 1558 Phaër æneid. iv. L ij b, Could I not of Ascanius chopping [have] made? and dresse for meate His flesh? 1585 Lloyd Treas. Health R iij, Englishe Galangale healethe the choppynges & depe woundes. 1653 H. Cogan tr. Pinto's Trav. xxxi. (1663) 122 The choppings they make of them. |
3. Short and abrupt motion, of the sea, waves, etc.
| 1633 T. James Voy. 25 The Anker hitcht againe, and vpon the chopping of a Sea, threw the men from the Capstang. 1725 De Foe Voy. round World (1840) 348 A rippling and chopping of the waves. |
4. attrib. and Comb., as chopping-board, chopping-machine, chopping-tool; chopping-bee N. Amer., a ‘bee’ for the cutting down of timber; chopping-block, a block or board used for chopping food, etc.; also transf. (colloq.), e.g. applied to a boxer who sustains steady punishment; chopping-knife, (a) a cleaver for cutting up, a chopper; (b) a knife with a handle at each end, for mincing meat, suet, etc.; chopping-stick (see chapping vbl. n. 2).
| 1809 Massachusetts Spy 12 July (Th.), At Bristol (Ver.), June 7, at a *chopping-bee, a limb of one of the falling trees struck one of the men. 1868 Western Mag. Jan. (De Vere), The inhabitants within a radius of ten miles were invited to a chopping-bee. 1890 Regina (Sask.) Jrnl. 18 Dec. 1/2 Come to the chopping bee and bring your axe. |
| 1703 Moxon Mech. Exerc. 196 The *Chopping-block is..made of a piece of Elm-Tree. 1823 P. Nicholson Pract. Build. 388 The Chopping-block is used for reducing bricks to any required form by means of the axe. 1865 Gosse Land & Sea (1874) 118 A thrush's chopping-block..birds of this family feed largely on snails, and..carry their prey to some selected stone, against which they hammer. 1926 T. E. Lawrence Seven Pillars Wisdom (1935) vi. 56 We found them just kept chopping-blocks of their commanders' viler passions. 1928 Daily Express 10 Aug. 15/6 The New Zealander was outclassed by the champion, and in the last three rounds was only a chopping block, but game to the last. 1930 Times Lit. Suppl. 29 May 455/1 Xenophon's ‘Anabasis’, made a chopping-block for generations of schoolboys. 1960 ‘B. Mather’ Pass beyond Kashmir v. 74 That got him nowhere except as a chopping block for four of them working in shifts. |
| 1675 Hobbes Odyss. 210 A *chopping-board was near him. 1855 Dickens Dorrit (Hoppe) A medley of..chopping-boards, rolling pins, and pie-crust. |
| 1552 Huloet, Bochers axe, or *Choppynge knyfe. 1694 Acc. Sev. Late Voy. ii. xi. (1711) 181 They also have..a Chopping knife, to cut off the Rope. 1837 Whittock Bk. Trades (1842) 81 The meat is cut small with a chopping-knife. |
| 1882 Mrs. H. Reeve Cookery & Housek. iv. (ed. 2) 19 The *chopping-machine..should be freed from all particles adhering after use. |
| 1681 S. Colvil Whigs Supplic. (1751) 71 It is the simplest of all tricks To suffer fools have *chopping sticks. |
▪ II. chopping, vbl. n.2
(ˈtʃɒpɪŋ)
[f. chop v.2]
1. Exchanging one thing for another; b. now almost exclusively in the phrase chopping and changing.
| a. 1581 J. Bell Haddon's Answ. Osor. 340 b, I know not what crooked & crabbed conveyaunce, and choppyng of matters together. 1625 Bacon Ess. Riches (Arb.) 237 As for the Chopping of Bargaines, when a Man Buies, not to Hold, but to Sell over againe. 1668 R. L'Estrange Vis. Quev. (1708) 122 This Case is no more than Chopping of a Cold Wife for a Warm one. |
| b. 1548 Udall Erasm. Par. Luke vi. 77 It is a choppyng and chaungyng of benefites one for another. 1563 Homilies ii. Fasting i. (1859) 285 Men..crafty and subtil in chopping and changing, using false weights. 1589 Pasquill's Ret. B., This chopping & changing of the Religion of the land. 1666 Pepys Diary (1879) III. 493 All the morning at my Tangier accounts, which the chopping and changing of my tallys make mighty troublesome. 1810 Southey Lett. in Life III. xvi. 275, I have no hope from chopping and changing while the materials must remain the same. |
c. with pl.
| 1585 Abp. Sandys Serm. (1841) 168 While we are thus occupied about these choppings and changings. 1880 Green Hist. Eng. People IV. viii. iv. 107 Diplomacy spent its ingenuity in countless choppings and changings of the smaller territories about the Mediterranean and elsewhere. |
2. chopping of logic: bandying of arguments.
| 1668 R. L'Estrange Vis. Quev. (1708) 4 No more chopping of Logick, good Mr. Conjurer. 1840 Carlyle Heroes (1858) 287 To listen to a few Protestant logic-choppings. |
3. Comb. † chopping-taker, a taker of bribes.
| a 1670 Hacket Abp. Williams i. (1692) 39 There was a chopping-taker in his family that was least suspected; but his Lordship's hands were clean. |
▪ III. chopping, a.
(ˈtʃɒpɪŋ)
[f. chop v.1: to be compared with strapping, thumping, bouncing, rapping, whopping.]
Big and vigorous; strapping. (Originally used more generally, but later only as an epithet of a fine, healthy, strong child.)
| 1566 Drant Horace Sat. iv. viij b, The murex fishe from Baiæ cums..From Circes choppynge oysters newe. 1581 N. Woodes Conflict Consc. v. iii. in Hazl. Dodsley VI. 115 Such chopping cheer as we have made, the like hath not been seen. 1598 Florio Pinchellone, a chopping boy, a handsome striplin. 1613 Heywood Silver Age iii. i., Alcmena is delivered, brought to bed Of a fine chopping boy. 1716 Cibber Love Makes Man ii. i, What chopping Children his Brother shall have. 1726 Amherst Terræ Fil. i. 151 A chopping, strapping chambermaid. 1785 Burke Sp. Nabob of Arcot's debts Wks. (1808) IV. 319 Six great chopping bastards, each as lusty as an infant Hercules. 1823 Month. Rev. CII. 542 She was delivered of a chopping child. a 1845 Hood Sausage Maker's Ghost iii. |
▪ IV. chopping, ppl. a.1
[f. chop v.1 + -ing2.]
1. Interrupted by chops or breaks; in fits and starts; not continuous; jerky; abrupt; broken.
| 1483 Vulgaria abs Terentio 17 a, Lettist me so wyth thy choppynge spekynge. 1593 Shakes. Rich. II, v. iii. 124 The chopping French we do not vnderstand. 1614 T. Adams Devil's Banquet Pref., Let me intreat thee, not to giue my Booke the chopping censure..Do not open it at a ventures, & by reading the broken pieces of two or three lines, iudge it. 1882 J. Parker Apost. Life (1884) III. 116 The man of one idea has a short and chopping way of speaking about other people. 1883 Fisheries Exhib. Catal. 46 The crew..pull a very short chopping stroke. |
2. Of the sea, waves, etc.: Giving a short, jerky movement (to things floating); breaking in short, abrupt waves, the result of a strong wind blowing against a tide or current, or of a change of wind, etc.
| [1622 Chapping sea: see chapping ppl. a. 2.] 1632 Lithgow Trav. ix. (1682) 380 We met with two contrary chopping Tides. 1633 T. James Voy. 25 There went a chopping short Sea. 1840 R. Dana Bef. Mast xxxv. 135 A stiff breeze..directly against the course of the current, made an ugly, chopping sea. 1877 Wallace Russia i. 20 The sledge..bobs up and down like a boat in a chopping sea. 1879 Long æneid v. 248 Malea's chopping waves. |
▪ V. ˈchopping, ppl. a.2
[f. chop v.2]
That chops.
| 1837 Ld. Cockburn Jeffrey II. Lett. cxxxvii, I should like to be in town in these chopping and changing times. |