[ad. F. trappiste, from La Trappe, name of the convent: see below.]
1. A monk of the branch of the Cistercian order observing the reformed rule established in 1664 by De Rancé, abbot of La Trappe, in Normandy.
1814. in Brackenridge, Views Louisiana, 288. To make the highest virtue to consist in silence, was reserved for the Trappists.
1836. Ld. Shrewsbury, in E. Purcell, Life A. P. de Lisle (1900), I. iv. 69. I … wish … to see a religious establishment on the premises; but I fancy we might have a much more useful one than a Trappist monastery.
1870. Rogers, Hist. Gleanings, II. 24. The most frivolous profligates have often become the most rigid … Trappists and Carthusians.
b. attrib. or as adj. Of or pertaining to this branch of the Cistercian order.
1847. Bunsen, Ch. of Future, App. 307. The Count purchased the old Trappist Monastery.
1860. All the Year Round, No. 74. 569. He intended to enter a Trappist convent.
1871. Morley, Crit. Misc., Ser. I. 28. The Trappist theory of the conditions of virtue.
2. transf. A puff-bird of the genus Monacha, having inky-black plumage with white about the head; a NUN-BIRD.
1897. in Cent. Dict.
