[app. radically allied to CRIMP v.1; perh. originally with the notion ‘yielding to pressure, easily compressed’; cf. however MHG. krimpf crooked, curved (Kluge), and CRISP a. for the transition from ‘curled, curly, crimped’ to ‘brittle, friable.’ Cf. also CRUMP a.]
1. ‘Friable, brittle, easily crumbled, easily reduced to powder’ (J.); crisp.
1587. Churchyard, Worth. Wales (1876), 28. So fresh, so sweete, so red, so crimp withall As man may say, loe, Sammon here at call.
1699. Evelyn, Acetaria (1729), 176. They will keep longer, and … eat crimp, and well tasted.
1708. J. Philips, Cyder, II. (1727), 50. Now the Fowler … with swift early steps Treads the crimp Earth.
1725. Bradley, Fam. Dict., s.v. Sallet, Slices of the whitened stems which bring crimp and short are eaten with oil, vinegar, salt, and pepper.
1832. Careless Little Boy (ed. 8), 12. The grass was crimp and white with the hoar frost.
b. Hence crimp-meat.
1656. W. D., trans., Comenius’ Gate Lat. Unl., ¶ 365. Som things also hee broileth on a gridiron, or frieth on a frying-pan, but if overmuch, they becom crimp-meat.
† 2. fig. ‘Not consistent, not forcible: a low cant word’ (J.) Obs.
[But this alleged sense is founded only on the following passage, in which some edd. have scrimp = ‘scant, limited, very sparing,’ which seems a better reading.]
1712. Arbuthnot, John Bull, II. iv. The evidence is crimp; the witnesses swear backwards and forwards, and contradict themselves.
3. Said of hair, feathers, etc.: Crimped.
1764. Anna Seward, in Poet. Wks. (1810), I. p. cxv. A bag wig, in crimp buckle, powdered white as the new shorn fleece.
1784. New Spectator, iii. 4/2. The head is adorned … with crimp feathers.
4. Comb., as crimp-frilled.
1821. Clare, Vill. Minstr., II. 131. Crimp-frilled daisy.
