beclap

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English biclappen (“to grasp, insnare, catch, to trap suddenly, to grab suddenly”), equivalent to be- +‎ clap.

Alternative forms

• beclapp

Verb

beclap (third-person singular simple present beclaps, present participle beclapping, simple past and past participle beclapped)

1. To grasp, insnare, ensnare, catch, to trap suddenly, to grab suddenly.
   • 1605, Tourneur, Worldes Folly:

     He so besmouched her, and she so beclapped him, and there tumbling together, as merrie as they would wish, I sighed to thinke, what a supper they would haue after break-fast.

Etymology 2

be- +‎ clap.

Verb

beclap (third-person singular simple present beclaps, present participle beclapping, simple past and past participle beclapped)

1. To clap for; to applaud.
   • 1886, The Nation, volume 43, page 414:

     No one is so beclapped as the author of a popular drama bowing over his own footlights; the artists and romancers of the daily press are modester than they themselves would be willing to admit.

   • 1891, Littell's living age, volume 191, page 260:

     In the course of his table-talk, during the French war, the ex-chancellor once remarked that, though the Prussian people huzza'd and beclapped their great Frederick when alive, […]

   • 1903, in New outlook (Alfred Emanuel Smith), volume 74, page 936:

     He who has loved quiet, who has so long shunned publicity, must school himself to be cheered and beclapped and huzzaed by thousands every time he lets himself be seen.