Lap

Lap - (Webster's 1828 Dictionary)

LAP, n.

1. The loose part of a coat; the lower part of a garment that plays loosely.

2. The part of clothes that lies on the knees when a person sits down; hence, the knees in this position.

Men expect that happiness should drop into their laps.

LAP, v.t.

1. To fold; to bend and lay over or on; as, to lap a piece of cloth.

To lap boards, is to lay one partly over another.

2. To wrap or twist round.

I lapped a slender thread about the paper.

3. To infold; to involve.

Her garment spreads, and laps him in the folds.

LAP, v.i. To be spread or laid; to be turned over.

The upper wings are opacous; at their hinder ends where they lap over, transparent like the wing of a fly.

LAP, v.i. [Gr. If m is casual in L. lambo, as it probably is, this is the same word.]

To take up liquor or food with the tongue; to feed or drink by licking.

The dogs by the river Nilus' side being thirsty, lap hastily as they run along the shore.

And the number of them that lapped were three hundred men. Judg 7.

LAP, v.t. To take into the mouth with the tongue; to lick up; as, a cat laps milk.

The word is the translation of three different Hebrew expressions: cheq (Pr 16:33), beghedh (2Ki 4:39), and chotsen (Ne 5:13, besides chatsen, Ps 129:7). In all these passages the meaning is that of a part of oriental clothing, probably the folds of the garment covering the bosom or lap of a person. The flowing garments of Orientals invite the use of the same, on the part of speakers, in driving home certain truths enunciated by impressive gesticulation. Every reader of Roman history recalls the impressive incident of Quintus Fabius Maximus (Cunctator), who, in 219 BC, was ambassador of Rome to Carthage, and who, before the city council, holding the folds of his toga in the shape of a closed pouch, declared that he held enclosed in the same both peace and war, whichever the Carthaginians should desire to choose. When the Carthaginians clamored for war, he opened the folds of his garment and said: "Then you shall have war!" Very much like it, Nehemiah, when pleading for united efforts for the improvement of social order, addressed the priests of Jerusalem to get a pledge of their cooperation: "Also I shook out my lap (chotsen), and said, So God shake out every man from his house, and from his labor, that performeth not this promise; even thus be he shaken out, and emptied" (Ne 5:13).

In English Versions of the Bible the verb "to lap" is found, which has no etymological connection with the above-mentioned nouns. It is in Hebrew laqaq and refers to the loud licking up of water by dogs (1Ki 21:19; 22:38 the King James Version), and in the story of Gideon's battle against the Midianites, of his 300 warriors (Jud 7:5).

H. L. E. Luering