Rape

Pronunciation

• IPA: /ɹeɪp/
• Rhymes: -eɪp

Probably alternative form of rope (as originally used to mark out boundaries).

Full definition of rape

Noun

1. (now historical) One of the six former administrative divisions of Sussex, England. from 11th c.
• 1971, Frank Merry Stenton, Anglo-Saxon England:There is little, if any, doubt that the division of Sussex into six rapes had been carried out before the Conquest, though the term is not mentioned in any Old English record.
• 1997, Ann Williams, The English and the Norman Conquest, p. 18:These four castles dominated the Sussex rapes named after them; the fifth rape, Bramber, held by William de Braose, was in existence by 1084.

From Middle English rapen, from Old Norse hrapa ("to fall, rush headlong, hurry, hasten"), from Proto-Germanic *hrapanÄ… ("to fall down"), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker- ("to move, swing, jump"). Cognate with Norwegian rapa ("to slip, fall"), Danish rappe ("to make haste"), German rappeln ("to hasten, hurry").

Verb

1. (obsolete, intransitive or reflexive) To make haste; to hasten or hurry. 14th-16th c.

Noun

1. (obsolete) Haste; precipitancy; a precipitate course. 14th-17th c.
• c. 1390, Geoffrey Chaucer, Wordes Unto Adam:So ofte a-daye I mot thy werk renewe, It to correcte and eek to rubbe and scrape; And al is thorugh thy negligence and rape.

Adverb

1. (obsolete) Quickly; hastily. 14th-19th c.

Probably from Latin rapere (verb), Anglo-Norman rap, rape (noun) (from Latin rapere). But compare Swedish rappa ("to snatch, seize, carry off"), Norwegian rapa ("to rip off"), Low German rapen ("to snatch, seize"), Dutch rapen ("to pick up, gather, collect"); the relationship with Germanic forms is not clear. Compare also rap ("seize, snatch").

"rape, v.2" and "rape, n.3" in the OED Online (Oxford University Press), http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/158153, http://www.oed.com/view/Entry/158145 (accessed September 12, 2012)

Verb

1. (transitive, intransitive) To seize by force. (Now often with overtones of later senses.) from 14th c.
• 1978, Gore Vidal, Kalki:Dr Ashok's eyes had a tendency to pop whenever he wanted to rape your attention.
• 1983, Alasdair Gray, ‘Logopandocy’, Canongate 2012 (Every Short Story 1951-2012), p. 136:It is six years since my just action to reclaim the armaments raped from here by the Lairds of Dalgetty and Tolly ....
2. (transitive) To carry (someone, especially a woman) off against their will, especially for sex; to abduct. from 15th c.
• 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, III.10:Paridell rapeth Hellenore:
  Malbecco her pursewes:
  Findes emongst Satyres, whence with him
  To turne she doth refuse.
• 1718, Alexander Pope, translating Homer, The Iliad:A Princess rap’d transcends a Navy storm'd.
3. (transitive) To force sexual intercourse or other sexual activity upon (someone) without their consent. from 16th c.That woman was arrested after she raped him.
4. (transitive) To plunder, to destroy or despoil. from 17th c.
• 1892, Rudyard Kipling, Barrack-Room Ballads:I raped your richest roadstead—I plundered Singapore!
5. (US slang, chiefly Internet) To overpower, destroy (someone); to trounce. from 20th c.''My experienced opponent will rape me at chess.

Synonyms

• (force sexual intercourse) ravish, violate, vitiate
• (abuse) plunder, despoil

Derived terms

• frape
• I've been raped
• rapable, rapeable
• rapist
• rapt
• rerape

Noun

1. (now rare) The taking of something by force; seizure, plunder. from 14th c.
• 1712, Alexander Pope, (title):The rape of the lock.
• SandysRuined orphans of thy rapes complain.
• 1977, JRR Tolkien, The Silmarillion:Few of the Teleri were willing to go forth to war, for they remembered the slaying at the Swanhaven, and the rape of their ships.
2. The act of forcing sexual intercourse upon another person without their consent or against their will; originally conceived as a crime committed by a man against a woman, but now often extended (under various legal systems) to include other kinds of forced sexual activity by persons of either sex. from 15th c.
• 1667, John Milton, Paradise Lost, II:I fled; but he pursued (though more, it seems,
  Inflamed with lust than rage), and, swifter far,
  Me overtook, his mother, all dismayed,
  And, in embraces forcible and foul
  Engendering with me, of that rape begot
  These yelling monsters ....
• 1990, ‘Turning Victims into Saints’, Time, 22 Jan 1990:Last April the media world exploded in indignation at the rape and beating of a jogger in Central Park.
3. (now archaic) The abduction of a woman, especially for sexual purposes. from 15th c.
• c. 1590, William Shakespeare, Titus Andronicus, First Folio 1623, I.1:Sat. Traytor, if Rome haue law, or we haue power,
  Thou and thy Faction shall repent this Rape.Bass. Rape call you it my Lord, to cease my owne,
  My true betrothed Loue, and now my wife?
• 2000, Mary Beard, The Guardian, 8 Sep 2000:The tale of the rape of Lucretia, for example, is hardly tellable - as many Roman writers themselves discovered - without raising the question of where seduction ends and rape begins; the rape of the Sabines puts a similar question mark over the distinction between rape and marriage.
4. (obsolete) That which is snatched away.
• SandysWhere now are all my hopes? O, never more.
  Shall they revive! nor death her rapes restore.
5. (obsolete) Movement, as in snatching; haste; hurry.

Derived terms

From Latin rapa, from rapum ("turnip").

Noun

1. rapeseed, Brassica napus
• 2001, Bill Lambrecht, Dinner at the New Gene Café, 231After the Industrial Revolution, it was discovered that rape also yields oil suitable for lubrication.

From Middle English rape, from Old French rape ("grape stalk, rasper"), from raper, rasper ("to rasp, scratch"), from Old Frankish *raspōn ("to scratch"), related to Old High German raspōn ("to scrape"), Old English ġehrespan ("to strip, spoil").

Noun

1. The stalks and husks of grapes from which the must has been expressed in winemaking.
2. A filter containing the stalks and husks of grapes, used for clarifying wine, vinegar, etc.
3. (obsolete) Fruit plucked in a bunch.a rape of grapes

Anagrams

• aper, pare, pear, reap