''hopper'' ▫ᴱᴺ Entries

↩ 🔳 🔳 🔳

---

Primary

⁀➴

''hopper'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260313192153-00-⌔

hopper - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

Noun

hopper (plural hoppers)

🖼️ ➺ 🖼️ ➺

• One who or that which hops.
• A temporary storage bin, filled from the top and emptied from the bottom, often funnel -shaped.
  • ✤ Synonym: feedbin
  • ✤ …forming the bottom of the hopper, in combination with the recriprocating longitudinal movement of the same, for the purpose of regulating the feed from the hopper, substantially as herein set forth.¹
• A funnel-shaped section at the top of a drainpipe used to collect water, from above, from one or more smaller drainpipes.
• A bin or device that feeds material into a machine.
  • ✤ Synonyms: feeder, feedbin
  • ✤ Having thus fully described my improved winnowing machine, what I claim therein as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent is in the forming of a series of shoulders one above another on the inclined board, forming the bottom of the hopper,…¹
• Any of various insects known for hopping, especially a grasshopper or locust, the immature form of a locust, or the larva of various flies and beetles.
  • ✤ I went over and found the mealies and ground covered with large hoppers, about two weeks old.²
  • ✤ “And the next year the hoppers came. The sky was so dark with them we had to light the lamps at midday.”³
• An artificial fishing lure.
  • ✤ To catch a big fish, use a hopper that jumps across the pond surface.
• (slang) A toilet.
  • ✤ The fresh-water container for the house was above the ceiling directly over the toilet. One day, I was comfortably seated on the hopper minding my own business, when a large portion of the ceiling came crashing down […]⁴
• (music) An escapement lever in a piano.
• (obsolete) The game of hopscotch.
• A window with hinges at the bottom, opened by tilting vertically.
• A hopper car.
• (chess) A fairy chess piece which moves only by jumping over another piece.
  • ✤ The Leo, Pao (or Cannon, a piece from Chinese chess) and Vao (Z.Mach FCR 1940) are hybrid hoppers that move like a queen, rook or bishop and capture along these lines like a lion.⁵
• A person or machine that picks hops.

Noun

hopper (plural hoppers)

• A Sri Lankan pancake made from a fermented batter of rice flour, coconut milk, and palm toddy or yeast.
  • ✤ * Hoppers come in different varieties and can be sweet or savoury, while an egg hopper has an egg in the middle added during cooking.*⁶

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ˈhɒp.ə(ɹ)/
• (Australian) IPA: /ˈhɔp.ə/
• (General American) IPA: /ˈhɑ.pɚ/
• Audio (Australian): 🔊
• Rhymes: -ɒpə(ɹ)

Etymology 1

From Middle English hoppere, alteration of ﹡hoppe (found in grashoppe (“grasshopper”)), from Old English ﹡hoppa (“one who hops, hopper”), equivalent to hop +‎ -er. Cognate with Dutch hopper (“hopper”), Swedish hoppare (“hopper, jumper”), Icelandic hoppari (“hopper”).

Etymology 2

From Sinhalese ආප්ප (āppa), from Tamil ஆப்பம் (āppam). Doublet of appam.

Printed 2026-06-28.

(echo:: @ ⌗)

Footnotes

1. 1847, editorial staff, “Winnowing Machines”, in Scientific American, series 1, Volume 3, Issue 9, page 68: ↩ ↩²

2. 1901, J. H. Stansell, “Locust Destruction”, in The Agricultural Journal and Mining Record ‎${}^{[1]}$, volume 4, page 21: ↩

3. 1975, Larry Woiwode, Beyond the Bedroom Wall, page 27: ↩

4. 2010, Robert Hudson, Stories of an Unusual Life, page 250: ↩

5. 2010 August 21, G. P. Jelliss, “Simple Chess Variants”, in Mayhematics ‎${}^{[2]}$, page 11: ↩

6. 2010, Channa Dassanayaka, Sri Lankan Flavours, page 20: ↩

Link to original

Secondary

• • •

---