Sop v.

Also 6 soppy, soppe. [OE. soppian, f. sopp SOP sb.¹ Cf. WFris. sopje, MDu. and Du. soppen (WFlem. zoppen) in sense 1; also WFlem. zoppen, Da. dial. soppe, in sense 2 a.]

  1.  trans. To dip, soak or steep (bread, etc.) in some liquid. Also absol.

  c. 1000.  Sax. Leechd., II. 228. ʓenim hlaf, ʓeseoð on gate meolce, soppiʓe on suþerne.

  a. 1529.  Skelton, E. Rummyng, 558. This ale, sayde she, is noppy, Let vs syppe and soppy, And not spyll a droppy.

1570.  Levins, Manip., 169/20. To soppe, offam intingere.

1597.  A. M., trans. Guillemeau’s Fr. Chirurg., 28/1. We must … first let him suppe in a soft dressed egge, or a morsell of breade sopped in wyne.

1610.  G. Fletcher, Christ’s Vict., II. xi. His cheekes as snowie apples, sop’t in wine, Had their red roses quencht with lilies white.

1629.  Massinger, Picture, V. i. (1630), M 1 b. Ricardo. for a messe of porridge well sop’d with a bunch of raddish and a carret I would sell my barronie but for women.

1719.  De Foe, Crusoe, I. (Globe), 209. I … let him see me … sop my Bread in it.

a. 1834.  Lamb, Months, Misc. Wks. (1871), 399. Everything … is sopped in claret.

1843.  G. P. R. James, Forest Days, ii. The peasant sat at the table, sopping his bread in the contents of his jug.

1887.  Ruskin, Præterita, II. 174. One might almost as hopelessly have sopped the Matterhorn as the loaf.

  b.  To drench with moisture; to soak; also fig., to intoxicate.

1682.  D’Urfey, Butler’s Ghost, 141. Like Country Vicar,… at a Wedding, or a Fair, Is sooner sopt than any there.

1683.  Moxon, Mech. Exerc., Printing, 391. When a Press-man has taken too much Inck, he is said to Sop the Balls.

1725.  Fam. Dict., s.v. June, The Water is to be supply’d as you find convenient, and no longer, lest it sop your Stem too much.

1788.  W. H. Marshall, Yorksh., I. 310. The covering moist and feeble, and the sod sopt with wet, fall heavy and flat to the ground.

1820.  Clare, Poems Rural Life (ed. 3), 127. The dews, brush’d off from grass and flowers, Bemoistening sop his harden’d shoes.

1847.  Emerson, Repr. Men, Montaigne, Wks. (Bohn), I. 348. We have been sopped and drugged with the air, with food [etc.].

  c.  To carry away by soaking.

1853.  Dickens, Bleak Ho., ii. An arch of the bridge in the park has been sapped and sopped away.

  2.  intr. a. To be, or become, soaking wet.

1831.  Miss Mitford, in The Remembrance, 40. Strawberries lay sopping in their beds.

  b.  Of moisture: To soak in or through.

1844.  Dickens, Mart. Chuz., xlvii. Sopping and soaking in among the leaves that formed its pillow; oozing down into the boggy ground,… went a dark, dark stain.

1894.  ‘Tom Cobbleigh’ (W. Raymond), Sam & Sabina, i. The water just sops through the turf.

  3.  [From SOP sb.¹] a. intr. To collect sops.

1755.  Smollett, Quix. (1803), II. 139. His necessity is not so great, but that he eats,… though he may feed upon the leavings of the rich, or … go a-sopping, as they term it.

  b.  trans. To propitiate; to bribe.

1837.  Carlyle, Fr. Rev., II. V. v. Danton and needy corruptible Patriots are sopped with presents of cash.

  Sop, obs. pa. t. SUP v.¹

  Sopar, obs. variant of SUPPER.