To clop is to make the sound of a hoof striking hard ground. Hooves clopping, clop along the street, a steady clop.
It belongs to horses on stone or road, not on grass, and the doubling — clip-clop — is what English uses for the alternating beat of two feet. The word is imitative, made directly from the noise.
1verbclopTo make the sound of a hoof on hard ground.
“A horse and cart clopped slowly down the cobbled street.”
clop is a sound.
An imitative word, related to Dutch kloppen, to knock. Clap comes from the same knocking.
Middle Dutch
cloppen — to make a clopping sound
Dutch
kloppen — to hit, knock
English, today
clop
Perhaps from German - or Dutch kloppen (“to hit, knock”), from Middle Dutch cloppen (“to make a clopping sound”), of onomatopoeic origin. See also clap.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA