trap

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“
I'll take it myself, as my trap is at the door."

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Definitions (81)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (27)

  1. noun A contrivance for catching and holding animals, as a concealed pit or a clamplike device that springs shut suddenly.
  2. noun A stratagem for catching or tricking an unwary person.
  3. noun A confining or undesirable circumstance from which escape or relief is difficult: fell into poverty's trap.
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Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (34)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (8)

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Examples (50)

  • He understood it in a moment, and next morning the trap was at the door at the specified time Before I left Stockholm I made a careful and elaborate panoramic sketch of the city, as a companion to the one I had made of Genoa from the harbour a year before. —  James Nasmyth: Engineer, An Autobiography.
  • But on the morning of the third day, he awakened us before dawn and said he had a nu-nu vision that the trap was about to be sprung. —  Omni: July 1993
  • "Well, the trap was a success, of a sort Success?" —  Challenging Destiny - 2005 - 21
  • What if this trap were as small as a spare tire, as light as a tire jack, and cost under a grand? —  India eNews
  • Motorists who received summonses over the affected period should go to court, speak to a traffic prosecutor and check that the camera trap was an authorised one. —  Motoring
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Related

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

trick ·  weapon ·  device ·  cage ·  hole ·  move ·  one ·  lie ·  bomb ·  lock ·  barrier ·  monster

Used in the same contextWord Family

trap:   traps ·  trapping ·  trapped
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 (9)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (3)

  1. Middle English, from Old English træppe.
  2. Middle English trap, trapping, perhaps alteration of Old French drap, cloth, from Late Latin drappus.
  3. Swedish trapp, from trappa, step, from Middle Low German trappe.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (6)

  1. from Middle English trappe, from Anglo-Saxon træppe, treppe =Middle Dutch trappe =Old High German trappa, trapa, a snare, trap; cf. Old French trappe, a trap, pitfall, French trappe, a trap-door, a pitfall, =Provencal trappa =Spanish trampa =Portuguese trapa =Italian diminutive trappola, from Middle Latin trappa, trapa, a trap (from Old High German); connected with Middle High German treppe, trappe, German treppe, a flight of steps, stair, ladder, =D. trap, a stair, etc., Middle Dutch, Dutch Middle Low German G. trappen, tread: see trap, trape, tramp. Hence ult. trapan.
  2. from Middle English trappen (also in comp. bitrappen), from Anglo-Saxon *træppan (in comp. betræppan) =Middle Dutch trappen, trap; from the noun.
  3. from D. trap, a step, degree. =Middle Low German trappe, treppe, German treppe, a step, round of a ladder, =Swedish trappa =Danish trappe, a stair: see trap and wentletrap.
  4. =G. trapp =Danish trap, from Swedish trapp, trap (rock), so called (by Bergmann, a Swedish mineralogist) with reference to the terraced or stair-like arrangement which may be observed in many of these rocks, from trappa, a stair: see trap.
  5. from Middle English trappe, from Old French *trap, drap, French drap =Provencal drap =Catalan drap =Spanish Portuguese trapo =Italian drappo, from Middle Latin drappus, drapis, trappus, trapus, a cloth, a horse-cloth, trapping; prob. of Teut origin; cf. drab, drape.
  6. from Middle English trappen, from Old French *trapper, from Middle Latin trappare, from trappus, cloth, horse-cloth: see trap, n. Hence trapper.
 

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/træp/
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