[f. TAPE sb.1]
1. trans. To attach a tape or tapes to; to supply with a tape; to fit with tapes; to tie up, fasten, bind, or wind with tape (also fig.); spec. in Bookbinding, to join the sections of (a book) with tape.
1609. T. Cocks, Diary (1901), 85. Given nursse for tapinge & starchinge my cuffes ijd.
1782. MacNally, Retaliation, II. Tru. Are you not taped, spliced, spiced, and glewed together like an Egyptian mummy?
1854. H. Miller, Sch. & Schm., xv. (1857), 347. Of that accessible store-house in which the memories of past events lie arranged and taped up.
1854. E. Mayhew, Dogs (1861), 241. [He] first, by way of precaution, tapes the animal; that is, he forms a temporary muzzle, by binding a piece of tape thrice firmly round the creature’s mouth.
1859. Thackeray, Virgin., lxxxiv. Every scrap of paper which we ever wrote, our thrifty parent … taped and docketed and put away.
1894. Bottone, Electr. Instr. Making (ed. 6), 115. The armature must also be most carefully taped and varnished. No part of the iron, where the wire has to be wound, should be left uncovered.
2. trans. To measure with a tape-line.
1886. [implied in TAPING ppl. a. below].
3. intr. To appear (of such a size) on measurement with a tape; to measure (so much).
1895. J. G. Millais, Breath fr. Veldt (1899), 237, note. A good Mashonaland head seldom tapes more than 12 inches.
4. trans. Sc. To measure out in tape-lengths; to deal out slowly or sparingly; to use sparingly.
1721. Ramsay, To R. H. B., vii. Then let us grip our Bliss mair sicker, And tape our Heal and sprightly Liquor.
1818. Scott, Hrt. Midl., xii. Ye sall hae a’ my skill and knowledge to gar the siller gang far—I’ll tape it out weel.
Hence Taped, Taping ppl. adjs., Taping vbl. sb.
1892. Daily News, 13 Oct., 7/2. Two large taped frames in the centre.
1886. Blackw. Mag., Sept., 337. Temporary taping-boys (employed on Ordnance Survey).
