[f. THUNDER sb. + CLAP sb.1] A clap or loud crash of thunder; formerly also, a thunderstroke. Often allusively used: cf. c.
c. 1386. Chaucer, Pars. T., ¶ 100. The Eyr … shal be ful of thonder clappes and lightnynges.
c. 1489. Caxton, Blanchardyn, liv. 218. Since it hath pleased … God to terrifie with his thunderclaps our feeble hearts.
1598. Hakluyt, Voy., I. 60. He was afterward slaine by a thunderclap.
1686. trans. Chardin’s Trav. Persia, 45. This Answer was like a Thunderclap.
1758. Borlase, Nat. Hist. Cornw., 15. The Thunder-claps were within a few minutes of one another.
1861. Sala, Dutch Pict., xi. 161. The news of the massacre of Scio burst upon us like a thunder-clap.
1864. C. Knight, Passages Work. Life, I. i. 17. I had gone to bed with a vague fear that I should be awakened by a terrific noise which would shake the house more than the loudest thunder-clap, and would produce such a concussion of the air as would break every window-pane in Windsor town.
b. transf. of other loud noises.
1610. R. Niccols, Winter Nt.’s Vis., K. Arthur, xxx. The thunder claps of clashing armes.
1711. Addison, Spect., 40, ¶ 6. With what Thunder-claps of Applause he leaves the Stage.
c. fig. A sudden startling, or terrifying occurrence, act, utterance, or piece of news. (Cf. THUNDERBOLT 2.)
1610. Holland, Camden’s Brit. (1637), 243. Untill that fatal thunder-clap [the Dissolution] overthrew all the Monasteries of England.
1665. Sir T. Herbert, Trav. (1677), 331. A thunderclap was heard … anathematizing Elharu-Esed.
1852. Jerdan, Autobiog., II. v. 49. A thunder-clap burst open and astonished Europe; Buonaparte had escaped from Elba.
1886. G. Allen, Maimie’s Sake, xxvii. It was as great a thunder-clap to me as to you.
