FromMiddle Englishpop,poppe(“a blow; strike; buffet”) (>Middle Englishpoppen(“to strike; thrust”,verb)), ofonomatopoeic origin – used to describe the sound, or short, sharp actions. The physics sense is part of a facetious sequence "snap,crackle, pop", after the mascots ofRice Krispies cereal.
2008 January–February, Matt Bean, “Your cultural calendar: 7 things to look forward to this year”, inMen's Health, volume23, number 1,→ISSN, page134:
British rockers Radiohead solved the "music is dead" dispute last year by allowing fans to name a price for the group's new album,In Rainbows. (More than a million albums sold in the first week alone, at an average $8a pop).
2023 November 4, Kim Duong, Megan Uy, Tarah-Lynn Saint-Elien, “22 Best Shackets to Get You Through the Chilly Fall Weather”, inCosmopolitan[1]:
Nothing screams fall like corduroy! I'm loving this deep seafoam green shacket—made of the thick, ribbed material—that'll give a fabpop of color to a muted ensemble.
And then I got a shock, for a couple of ragged patriots standing close by, leaned over as Elliot moved, their eyes shining viciously, and quick as winking out came theirpops, and I saw them ready and willing, yes, darned anxious to shoot.
(US, mostly in plural) A small,immaturepeanut, boiled as a snack.
1986,Mid-America Folklore, volume14, page 6:
Immature peanuts, called "pops," are often included when the peanuts are boiled at home[…]
2013, Becky Billingsley,A Culinary History of Myrtle Beach & the Grand Strand:
If the peanuts weren't yet mature, boiling them would make the tiny nuts—or “pops,” as they're called at that immature stage—swell up and become more filling.
2017, Kenny Attaway,Black Cream: A Handful of Sky & a Pocketful of Confetti[2]:
Although they go by many names across the world freezer pop, ice-pole, pop stick icy-pole ice pop, tip top and ice candy but in the hoods of America they are known and respected as Freeze Pops. Thepops are made by freezing flavored liquid such as sugar water, Kool-Aid or some form of fruit juice or purée inside a plastic tube - at least the kinds we ate.
"To torture another metaphor, it would be the difference between slowly letting the air out of a balloon, andpopping it. Though the dam metaphor is more apt, what with the excess magic flooding outward."
(intransitive, within,out,upon, etc.) To enter, or issue forth, with a quick, sudden movement; to move from place to place suddenly; to dart.
2011 July 18, Robert Costa, “The Battle from Waterloo: Representative Bachmann runs for president”, inNational Review:
She also looked like a star - and not the Beltway type. On a stage full of stiff suits, shepopped.
2024 September 5, Beth Gillette, “24 Fall Hair Colors Every Celebrity Is Asking for Rn”, inCosmopolitan[3]:
IK what you’re thinking: Why bright for fall? But it’s actually a great hack for making your hairpop a bit more against all those big black coats and jackets.
2010, Enrico Perla, Massimiliano Oldani,A Guide to Kernel Exploitation: Attacking the Core, page55:
Once the callee (the called function) terminates, it cleans the stack that it has been locally using andpops the next value stored on top of the stack.
2011, John Mongan, Noah Kindler, Eric Giguère,Programming Interviews Exposed:
The algorithmpops the stack to obtain a new current node when there are no more children (when it reaches a leaf).
I had topop my watch to see me through until pay-day.
1773,The Westminster Magazine, Or, The Pantheon of Taste:
I often used to smile at a young Ensign of the Guards, who alwayspopped his sword and watch when he wanted cash for an intrigue;[…]
1878,Fun, volumes27-28, page92:
Mr. Attenborough is naturally indignant at the accusation of Lord Truro that every pawnbroker keeps a smelting apparatus on the premises. He says the practice has been discontinued for many years, and our esteemed relative — the Universal Uncle — objects to the insinuation that when a thing ispopped itgoes to pot.
(transitive,slang) Toswallow or consume (especially a tablet of a drug, sometimes extended to other small items such as sweets or candy).
1994, Ruth Garner, Patricia A. Alexander,Beliefs about text and instruction with text:
We were drinking beer andpopping pills — some really strong downers. I could hardly walk and I had no idea what I was saying.
2008 January–February, “70 Ways to Improve Every Day of the Week”, inMen's Health, volume23, number 1,→ISSN, page135:
31pop some chocolate You'll stay sharp and focused for that final lunge toward the weekend. Milk chocolate has been shown to boost verbal and visual memory, impulse control, and reaction time.
(transitive,informal) To perform (a move or stunt) while riding a board or vehicle.
Pop a U-turn. You missed the turnoff.
1995, David Brin,Startide Rising:
Huck spun along the beams and joists, making me gulp when shepopped a wheelie or swerved past a gaping hole...
2009, Ben Wixon,Skateboarding: Instruction, Programming, and Park Design:
The tail is the back of the deck; this is the part that enables skaters topop ollies...
2021 June 30, Tim Dunn, “How we made... Secrets of the London Underground”, inRAIL, number934, page49:
With its airtight seals, the pressure change as trains entered the black, dust-covered station areas caused our ears topop and doors to flap and bang every time.
Pop, would go one of the eight-inch guns; a small flame would dart and vanish, a little white smoke would disappear, a tiny projectile would give a feeble screech - and nothing happened.
So he scraped and scratched and scrabbled and scrooged and then he scrooged again and scrabbled and scratched and scraped, working busily with his little paws and muttering to himself, 'Up we go! Up we go!' till at last,pop! his snout came out into the sunlight, and he found himself rolling in the warm grass of a great meadow.
1822, Mikhaïlov Vasiliï,Adventures of Michailow, section 4:
There was at that time in the house of the Consul aPop (or Russian Priest) namedIwan Afanassich.
2001, Spas Raïkin,Rebel with a Just Cause,292 n.28:
The contemporary priest's... own children are ashamed and some abusers are openly "transmitting thepop" (a gesture of mocking the priest on the street, where a man would touch his private parts while smiling at other passers-by)
2006, Peter Neville,A Traveller's History of Russia, section 123:
By the end of 1809she was declaring to all and sundry that she would sooner marry 'apop than the sovereign of a country under the influence of France'. Since apop was a Russian Orthodox parish priest, the reference was hardly likely to endear her family to the French.
FromMiddle Dutchpoppe, fromLatinpupa; sense of “cocoon, pupa” fromNew Latin. The sense “guilder” derived from student slang as a reference to the image of theDutch Maiden on guilders from 1694 until the early nineteenth century.
“pop”, inKielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish][5] (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki:Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland),2004–, retrieved2023-07-03
Walter Breu and Giovanni Piccoli (2000),Dizionario croato molisano di Acquaviva Collecroce: Dizionario plurilingue della lingua slava della minoranza di provenienza dalmata di Acquaviva Collecroce in Provincia di Campobasso (Parte grammaticale)., pp. 395
“pop”, inSlovníkový portál Jazykovedného ústavu Ľ. Štúra SAV [Dictionary portal of the Ľ. Štúr Institute of Linguistics, Slovak Academy of Science] (in Slovak),https://slovnik.juls.savba.sk,2003–2025
R. J. Thomas, G. A. Bevan, P. J. Donovan, A. Hawke et al., editors (1950–present), “pop”, inGeiriadur Prifysgol Cymru Online (in Welsh), University of Wales Centre for Advanced Welsh & Celtic Studies
