pip
noun
[ pɪp ]
• a small hard seed in a fruit.
• an excellent or very attractive person or thing.
• "it's a pip of a story"
Origin:
late Middle English (denoting a variety of apple): abbreviation of pippin (the current sense dates from the late 18th century).
pip
noun
• a star (one to three according to rank) on the shoulder of an army officer's uniform.
• any of the spots on a playing card, dice, or domino.
• an image of an object on a radar screen.
Origin:
late 16th century (originally peep, denoting each of the dots on playing cards, dice, and dominoes): of unknown origin.
pip
noun
• a short high-pitched sound used especially to indicate the time on the radio or to instruct a caller using a public phone to insert more money.
Origin:
early 20th century: imitative.
pip
noun
• a disease of poultry or other birds causing thick mucus in the throat and white scale on the tongue.
Origin:
late Middle English: from Middle Dutch pippe, probably from an alteration of Latin pituita ‘slime’. In the late 15th century the word came to be applied humorously to unspecified human diseases, and later to ill humour.
pip
verb
• (of a young bird) crack (the shell of the egg) when hatching.
• "as the eggs are being pipped the female clucks"
Origin:
late 19th century: perhaps of imitative origin.
pip
verb
• defeat by a small margin or at the last moment.
• "you were just pipped for the prize"
Origin:
late 19th century: from pip1 or pip2.
