Strop

Quick meaning: Strop is a noun meaning (nautical) A piece of rope spliced into a circular wreath, and put round a block for hanging it.

Meaning

(nautical) A piece of rope spliced into a circular wreath, and put round a block for hanging it.

More Meanings

1. To hone (a razor or knife) with a strop.
2. (UK, Ireland, Commonwealth) A bad mood or temper. A tantrum.
3. A strap; more specifically a piece of leather or a substitute (notably canvas), or strip of wood covered with a suitable material, for honing a razor.
4. (computing) To mark a sequence of letters syntactically as having a special property, such as being a keyword, e.g. by enclosing in apostrophes as in 'foo' or writing in uppercase as in FOO.
5. (obsolete) To strap.
6. (slang) A poor-quality or unsaleable diamond.

Example Sentences

One should strop the razor before each shave.

The barber—a round, bustling fellow—stropped his razor and prattled gossip.

[…] he almost fell out of the phone booth laughing and said to her, 'Boy, did my son buy a strop! Did he get stuck!'

Cheap razors are a mistake, as they soon lose their edge. A good razor requires no strop. It has been suggested as an excellent plan to have a case of seven razors—one for each day in the week—so that they are all equally used.

Word Forms

• strops
• stropping
• stropped

Synonyms for strop

Depending on context, synonyms include huff.

Related Words

Related dictionary entries include razor, hone, strap, strally, strapping, string.

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