taper

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Definitions (32)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (10)

  1. noun A small or very slender candle.
  2. noun A long wax-coated wick used to light candles or gas lamps.
  3. noun A source of feeble light.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (12)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (4)

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Examples

  • Mass was performing in several of the splendid chapels, whose rich decorations of paintings and sculpture are but once a year revealed to the light, save from the obscure glimmering of the wax-taper, which is carried by the guide, to occasional visitors. —  Letters and Journals 01
  • Conan reached out to extinguish the flickering taper, then thought better of it. —  Conan The Warlord
  • He finished and blew out the taper, then moved about the room in his usual soft-footed way, tidying the small disorder left by the afternoon guests, adding wood to the fire, puffing it into crackling life with the bellows. —  Drums of Autumn
  • In the glow from the taper, the small castle seems to glitter, though the walls are clearly solid, if somewhat sketchily etched in the hammered metal. —  The Towers of the Sunset
  • If the taper is a gradual one and the pivot a good close fit, there will be little danger of it loosening while dressing to shape. —  A Treatise on Staff Making and Pivoting Containing Complete Directions for Making and Fitting New Staffs from the Raw Material
 

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Taper has been looked up 298 times, favorited 0 times, listed 13 times, and commented on once.

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Roget's II Roget's II: The New Thesaurus

Allen's Allen's Synonyms and Antonyms

Used in the same context Used in the Same Context

stubby ·  cylindrical ·  swept-back ·  slender ·  candle ·  triangular ·  upper ·  horizontal ·  angular ·  lantern ·  curve ·  tubular
Roget's II: The New Thesaurus, Third Edition by the Editors of the American Heritage® Dictionary. Copyright © 2003, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Etymologies (5)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. Middle English, from Old English tapor, possibly ultimately from Latin papyrus, papyrus (sometimes used for candlewicks); see paper.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (4)

  1. from Middle English taper, from Anglo-Saxon tapor, taper, a candle, taper; perhaps from Irish tapar = Welsh tampr, a taper, torch; cf. Sanskrit √ tap, burn.
  2. Prob. first, in comp.; from taper, a candle; so called from the converging form of the flame of a candle (or, less prob., from the converging form of the candle itself). It is possible that the noun preceded the adjective, and that taper, n., is merely a transferred use of taper, n. The Anglo-Saxon *tæper, in comp. tæper-æx = Icelandic tapar-öx, an ax, is not related, being ult. of Persian origin, through Scandinavian from Finn. tappara, from Russian toporǔ, = Polish topor, etc., = Old Bulgarian toporu = Hungarian topor = Armenian tapar = Turkish teber, from Persian tabar, an ax, a hatchet.
  3. from taper, a.
  4. from taper, v.
 

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/ˈteɪpər/
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