Now dial. [Of fanciful formation: cf. WHIPPER-SNAPPER.] A young insignificant or conceited fellow.
c. 1590. Marlowe, Dr. Faustus, xi. 1161. Ile seeke out my Doctor…: O yonder is his snipper snapper.
1600. Dekker, Shoemaker’s Holiday, iv. Quick snipper-snapper, away Firke, Scour thy throat.
1638. Ford, Fancies, I. ii. Thou’rt a prick-ear’d foist,… a knack, a snipper-snapper!
1677. Poor Robin’s Vision, 12. Having ended his discourse, this seeming gentile snipper-snapper vanisht.
1835. Moore, Mem. (1856), VII. 108. Far better worth listening to than many of the young snipper-snappers of his profession.
1854. Miss Baker, Northampt. Gloss., Snipper-snapper. A small, insignificant, effeminate, self-conceited young man.
