{"id":13552,"date":"2017-02-10T18:21:18","date_gmt":"2017-02-10T17:21:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/blog\/?p=13552"},"modified":"2017-02-10T18:21:18","modified_gmt":"2017-02-10T17:21:18","slug":"a-load-of-old-claptrap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=13552","title":{"rendered":"A load of old claptrap"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Claptrap<\/strong> is a great word that means &#8217;empty verbiage or nonsense&#8217;. A claptrap was a also device that produced a clapping sound and was used in theaters to encourge applause from audiences. It can also mean &#8216;a trick or device to gain applause; humbug&#8217;. Synonyms include waffle, hot air and palaver.<\/p>\n<p>The word apparently comes from Theatre slang and refers to theatrical techniques or gags used to incite applause.<\/p>\n<p>It first appeared in print in Nathan Bailey\u2019s dictionary of 1721, which defined it as, \u201cA Clap Trap, a name given to the rant and rhimes that dramatick poets, to please the actors, let them get off with: as much as to say, a trap to catch a clap, by way of applause from the spectators at a play.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Over time the meaning of claptrap expanded to showy or insincere platitures or mawkish sentimetality, and from there to mean rubbish or nonsense.<\/p>\n<p>Sources: <em><a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/claptrap\">Wiktionary<\/a>, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.worldwidewords.org\/qa\/qa-cla1.htm\">World Wide Words<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>Do similar words exist in other languages?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Claptrap is a great word that means &#8217;empty verbiage or nonsense&#8217;. A claptrap was a also device that produced a clapping sound and was used in theaters to encourge applause from audiences. It can also mean &#8216;a trick or device to gain applause; humbug&#8217;. Synonyms include waffle, hot air and palaver. The word apparently comes [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,107,10,78],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13552","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-etymology","category-language","category-words-and-phrases"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13552\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}