kipe

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈkaɪp/

• Audio (Southern England):

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Etymology 1

From Middle English kipe, kype, from Old English cȳpe, cȳpa (“basket”), from Proto-Germanic *kipǭ, *kippǭ, from Proto-Indo-European *gey- (“to bend, twist”).

Akin to Middle Low German kīpe ("basket"; > German Low German Kiep, Kiepke (“basket”), German Kiepe (“carrying basket”)), Norwegian kaup (“wooden box; crate”).

Alternative forms

• kype

Noun

kipe (plural kipes)

1. (fishing) An osier basket used for catching fish.
   • 1947, Brian Waters, Severn Tide, J. M. Dent, page 149:

     The completed kipe looks like a crinoline made for a giantess; from the slender waist the skirts swell to a diameter of eight feet at the hem.
     The kipe is only the mouth to the fisherman's elaborate trap and is fixed so that it faces up-river.

Etymology 2

Perhaps from dialectal kip (“to snatch”).

Alternative forms

• kipp, kype, kypp

Verb

kipe (third-person singular simple present kipes, present participle kiping, simple past and past participle kiped)

1. (slang) To steal.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:steal

   • 1987 [1984], James Ellroy, chapter 22, in Because the Night, New York: Avon, →ISBN, page 189:

     Johnny imagines all manner of chrome gadgetry that he could kipe and give to his father to jazz up his ’fifty-six Ford Vicky ragtop.

Etymology 3

A salmon with the beginnings of a kipe as it enters fresh water.

Noun

kipe (plural kipes)

1. Alternative spelling of kype (“upturned lower jaw of a male salmonid”)

Further reading

• “kipe v.”, in Green’s Dictionary of Slang, Jonathon Green, 2016–present

Anagrams

• pike, kepi, képi, Pike