chop

UK/t͡ʃɒp/US/t͡ʃɑp/

verbA24 meanings Very common — you will meet it every day · #1,999 of 15,258leans spoken

Other forms: chopped, chops, chopping

To chop is to cut with short, hard strokes — an onion under a knife on the board, a log under an axe. Down, again, again.

The particles matter: you chop up a carrot, chop off a branch, chop down a tree. As a noun, a chop is a thick cut of meat on the bone — a pork chop, lamb chops under the grill. It is also a short downward blow with the edge of the hand, the karate chop. Out at sea, chop is the short bad-tempered waves that slap a boat about and turn stomachs. British English adds two phrases: to chop and change is to keep altering your plans, and to get the chop is to be sacked or cancelled.

Definitions of chop

1verbchopTo cut something into pieces with short heavy strokes of a knife or axe.A2
“Chop the onions finely and fry them in butter.”
- Said"Can you chop the onions while I find the pan?"
- WrittenHe chopped through the whole bag of carrots without looking up once.
- UsedChop the herbs at the last minute, or they lose their smell.
- ContrastChop, not cut. Cut is any use of a knife; chop is short heavy strokes into small pieces. cut →
- Not thisYou do not chop bread or a cake; you slice those. Chopping is for vegetables and logs.
- Exchange"Finely or roughly?""Roughly. Just chop it and get it in the pot."
Patternchop + noun (onions, wood, parsley) · chop sth up / into pieces · finely / roughly chopped · a chopping board
2nounthickA thick slice of meat with a piece of bone left in it.B1
“He ordered a pork chop and a plate of chips.”
3noundownwardA short downward blow struck with the side of the hand.B2
“One chop to the back of the neck and the man went down.”
4nounroughShort, rough waves on open water.C1
“There was enough chop out there to soak everyone in the boat.”

Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.

Remember it

CHOP → chop, chop, chop on the board

Listen to the knife on the board: chop, chop, chop, and everything is in small pieces.

Phrases it lives in

chop and change — keep changing your plans or methods
get the chop — be dismissed from a job, or be cancelled

Where it comes from

Chop comes from Middle English choppen, and nobody is certain where that came from. It may be the sound of the blow itself, or a version of chap, 'to become cracked'. Its lookalikes are all over the North Sea coast — Dutch kappen, German kappen, both meaning to cut or hew — and it may be a relative of chip.

Middle English
choppen
English, today
chop

Built from

chappen · Middle English — to chop
chap · English — to become cracked

From Middle English choppen, chappen (“to chop”), of unknown origin, possibly imitative of the sound (cf. tjoff), or a variant of chap (“to become cracked”). Cognate with Scots chap (“to chop”). Compare also stq kappe, kapje (“to hack; chop; lop off”), Dutch kappen (“to chop, cut, hew”), German Low German kappen (“to cut off; clip”), German kappen (“to cut; clip”), German dialectal chapfen, kchapfen (“to chop into small pieces”), Albanian copë (“piece, chunk”), Old English ċippian (in forċippian (“to cut off”)). Perhaps related to chip. Compare couper, κόπτω, sv,no, kappa, kabba (“to chop/cut (off)”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in In the Kitchen, Sea & Sailing, Cutting & Breaking

Practise this word

chop in the wild

The most common kinds of meat chops are pork and lamb.
Meat chop
A thin boneless chop, or one with only the rib bone, may be called a cutlet, though the difference is not always clear.
Meat chop
Waist chop or waist cutting, also known as cutting in two at the waist, was a form of execution used in ancient China.
Waist chop
The Atlanta Braves tomahawk chop and name controversy involves the name and tomahawk chop tradition by the Atlanta Braves, an American Major League Baseball (MLB) franchise.
Atlanta Braves tomahawk chop and name controversy
Native American objections to the tomahawk chop received much attention during the 1990s and have continued into the 2020s.
Atlanta Braves tomahawk chop and name controversy

1 / 2

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

Related words

the chap family

chop

chop — used about once every 247 pages · #1,999 · point at the bar for the others

chopsticks

Definitions of chop

1verbchopTo cut something into pieces with short heavy strokes of a knife or axe.A2

“Chop the onions finely and fry them in butter.”

Said"Can you chop the onions while I find the pan?"
WrittenHe chopped through the whole bag of carrots without looking up once.
UsedChop the herbs at the last minute, or they lose their smell.
ContrastChop, not cut. Cut is any use of a knife; chop is short heavy strokes into small pieces. cut →
Not thisYou do not chop bread or a cake; you slice those. Chopping is for vegetables and logs.
Exchange"Finely or roughly?""Roughly. Just chop it and get it in the pot."

Patternchop + noun (onions, wood, parsley) · chop sth up / into pieces · finely / roughly chopped · a chopping board

2nounthickA thick slice of meat with a piece of bone left in it.B1

“He ordered a pork chop and a plate of chips.”

3noundownwardA short downward blow struck with the side of the hand.B2

“One chop to the back of the neck and the man went down.”

4nounroughShort, rough waves on open water.C1

“There was enough chop out there to soak everyone in the boat.”

Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.