dop, noun

/dɔp/
Forms:
Also with initial capital.
Plurals:
dops, doppe /ˈdɔppə/.
Origin:
South African Dutch, DutchShow more South African Dutch, from Dutch dop husk, shell.
1. A container or lid.
a. Any more-or-less bowl-shaped or spherical object, as a bowl, husk, shell, skull, etc. Cf. doppie sense 1 c.
1841 B. Shaw Memorials 144I here engage, before God and his people, that the dop (part of a calabash which serves as a cup) shall no more pass my lips.
1920 Chambers’s Jrnl (U.K.) Aug. 482The vessel or ‘dop’ is then lifted off and the full effect of the operation (sc. cutting hair) is disclosed.
[1946 S. Cloete Afr. Portraits 65Kruger belonged to the Christelijk-Gereformeerde Church..called the ‘Dopper’ or canting church, the word ‘dop’ deriving from a dop, a damper, or extinguisher used for putting out candles, the idea being that the Doppers were against all new ideas and put them out ‘as a dop put out a candle.’]
1970 Informant, Grahamstown (now Makhanda, Eastern Cape)I wish I could get this Latin into my dop (brain, head).
1978 J. Hobbs Darling Blossom 57Another thing about Dumbo, he scorns to wear a crash helmet (what he calls a dop)...He reckons nobody’s gonna catch him looking like a..pampoen.
b. Usually in pl. : Grape-skins, the residue which is left after grapes have been pressed for wine-making; doppie sense 1 b.
1909 E. London Dispatch 18 May 5It is a fair assumption that ‘Dops’ are at present responsible for an output of from 500,000 to 600,000 gallons per annum.
1913 C. Pettman Africanderisms 151The skins of the grapes are called dops.
1979 M. Parkes Wheatlands 26Parkes’ Brandy became a legend...It is said that the secret lay in the distilling from ‘most’, instead of from the ‘dops’ or skins or refuse.
1988 J. Taylor in Inside S. Afr. July 31Now you must work fast and take off the skins. This is where a press would come in handy. If you haven’t got one then you will have to resort..to wringing the doppe out in sacking with your bare hands.
2. noncount. a. In full dop brandy: i. In historical contexts. A brandy distilled from the grape-husks left after grapes have been pressed for wine-making, and usually aged in wood; Cape dop (see sense c below); cf. witblits sense b. ii. transferred sense Any brandy; see also Cape brandy. b. transferred sense. Any spirituous drink. Also attributive.
1870 E. Prov. Herald 13 Sept.250 hogsheads White Dop Brandy,..40 hogsheads Fine Old Boer Brandy, 10 hogsheads Cango Brandy.
1881 E. London Dispatch & Frontier Advertiser 2 Feb. 4Ex various steamers: Cape Meal, 1st and 2nd., Dop Brandy, Superior Cango Brandy.
1888 Cape Punch 25 Jan. 35The Sabbath Day it is the Lord’s, And cursed be all who break it (The deadly Dop it is the Boer’s, And blest are they who make it).
1895 W.C. Scully Kaffir Stories 18Jim..got his daily number of tots of poisonous ‘dop’ brandy.
1896 R. Wallace Farming Indust. of Cape Col. 159Brandy, dop or Cape smoke, is a product derived from Cape wines, in the making of which the grape stalks are removed.
1900 O. Osborne In Land of Boers 68From the residue of skins, stalks, and jimmy-jam which remains in the vats, dop brandy was afterwards distilled, and a very excellent and pure spirit it rendered.
1903 R. Kipling Five Nations 201Ah there, Piet! — be’ind ‘is stony kop, With “is Boer bread an” biltong, an’ ’is flask of awful Dop.
1910 ‘R. Dehan’ Dop Doctor 98‘Dop,’ being the native name for the cheapest and most villainous of Cape brandies, has come to signify alcoholic drinks in general.
1924 L. Cohen Reminisc. of Jhb. 28There was floating about any amount of Cape smoke, square face, dop brandy, and a horrible local liquid preparation made of raw potato spirit, tobacco juice and pepper.
1931 F.C. Slater Secret Veld 116I think you must have had a flask of dop with you this afternoon. You must take more water with it in future!
1942 S. Cloete Hill of Doves 31It would be safer to take a barrel of dop from a wedding than a single mealie cob from you.
1950 L.G. Green At Daybreak for Isles 4Dop brandy was to be had for sixpence a bottle.
1960 Our First Half Century 1910–1960 445‘Dop brandy’ distilled from husks, has long been taxed out of existence by a prohibitive excise duty and there are few other countries where the distillation of husks is so firmly suppressed as in the Union.
1969 I. Vaughan Last of Sunlit Yrs 11He never explained how he fell from his high estate to his present lowly one,..but I am almost certain it was due to his failing with the dop bottle, for he was drunk every weekend.
1977 C. Clayton in Contrast 43 Vol.11 No.3, 23Too bladdy drunk, old Alice, too bladdy drunk. But they mustn’t ask me to give up my dop. Life’s too short for that.
1983 D. Hughes et al. Complete Bk of S. Afr. Wine 93Brandy..has a strong, separate tradition..in South Africa. ‘Dop’, ‘Witblits’,..‘Boerblits’, and ‘Cape Smoke’ were some of the names by which local brandy was known in earlier years.
1985 D. Baskin in Frontline Dec. 10Mrs Potgieter’s liquor licence..prevents the sale of white dop to Blacks, coloureds or Indians unless they are staying at the hotel.
1990 R. Gool Cape Town Coolie 15When I think of all that dop brandy in the cellar!
1991 Best of S. Afr. Short Stories (Reader’s Digest Assoc.) 92Used as a general term for a tot or a drink, especially of spirits, ‘dop’ more specifically refers to brandy.
c. historical. With defining word, Cape dop: dop brandy, see sense 2 a i. Also attributive.
1896 Johannesburg Weekly Times 8 Aug. 8Several samples of whiskies, Cape dop, and Cape brandy were examined.
1921 Chambers’s Jrnl (U.K.) 647The Cape ‘dop’ bottle brought oblivion to his tortured mind.
1935 H.C. Bosman in S. Gray Makapan’s Caves (1987) 89The predikant..was quite overpowered at the thought that a member of his church was going into the bar, during Nagmaal, to drink cheap Cape dop.
1937 H. Sauer Ex Afr. 29After supper tobacco pouches were again exchanged, and the master of the house produced a bottle of peach brandy or Cape dop.
1968 L.G. Green Full Many Glorious Morning 173Among the sweets was a dop flame pudding; you cut up a tinned sponge cake saturate it with ‘good Cape dop’, set it alight and serve it blazing.
1972 Sunday Times 23 Apr. (Mag. Sect.) 4The canteens carried a surprisingly large range of goods — from Cape ‘dop’ and ‘mampoer’ to imported liquors.
3.
a. colloquial. A drink; a quantity of alcohol; a ‘tot’ of spirits; doppie sense 3. Cf. sopie.
1950 Cape Times 17 June (Weekend Mag.) 5The pay of the mailer is good...Added to this, there is an occasional dop from both shebeener and customer.
1961 Cape Argus 8 Aug. 2He wanted to buy a ‘dop’.
1963 A. Fugard Blood Knot (1968) 113Some of them used to come back six times and try, with a dop in between to give them hope.
1969 A. Fugard Boesman & Lena 42Few dops and a guitar and its voetsek yesterday and to hell with tomorrow.
1970 Post 15 Mar. 9I’m thinking of those farmers in the vineyards of the Cape who pay their labourers with a dop of wine.
1981 Fair Lady 9 Sept. 250They are addicted to pinball machines, motor bikes, racing and having a dop — not necessarily in that order.
1985 Sunday Times 8 Sept. (Lifestyle) 2He..enjoyed a couple of dops of his favourite tipple.
1988 Smuts & Alberts Forgotten Highway through Ceres & Bokkeveld 184You put a quid in your cheek — just now you’re like a man who’s had a good few dops of wine; after a while you feel nothing.
1990 R. Malan My Traitor’s Heart 242So I said to Andries, ‘Call your boy to the door, man, and I’ll give him a dop (a shot of spirits), too’.
1993 S. Gray in Weekly Mail & Guardian 5 Nov. 48As a newcomer I was stood my first complimentary dop of the local mampoer — 75 percent proof, not a degree less.
b. With defining word: overdop, an extra quantity of wine given to workers under the tot system (see tot noun2 sense 2).
1952 ‘Mr Drum’ in Drum June 8When there is extra work or they have to work at week-ends, they are given an extra tot or ‘overdop’ as an incentive.
c. combinations
dop system, tot system (see tot noun2 sense 2) .
1987 Cape Times 17 Apr. 4The outdated and obviously wrong practices such as the dop system have been discarded by most farmers a long time ago.
1987 G. Hill in South 2 July 6Wages are still low and he and his fellow workers are still on the ‘dop’ system.
1989 M. Fridjhon in Financial Mail 10 Nov. 157The use of prison labour and application of the dop system (part payment of wages in alcohol) provide an emotional rallying point.
1991 Weekend Argus 26 Jan. 10The central theme this year is to combat alcohol abuse and the infamous ‘dop system’ — in which farmers ‘pay’ workers with alcohol.
1991 J. Platter in Sunday Tribune 19 May 18Important wine authors in Britain..always included the Dop system among specific anti-apartheid aversions. Let’s hope the Dop will be history soon.
4. In the noun phrase dop en dam, also dop and dam, dop-en-dum, dop-’n-dam /ˌdɔpənˈdam/ [Afrikaans, dop brandy + en and + dam ‘dam’ i.e. water], (a drink of) brandy and water.
1964 D. Marais I Like it Here (cartoon)Take that filthy stuff (sc. whisky) away and bring me a good, honest dop-en-dam.
1965 J. Bennett Hawk Alone 72‘Dop-’n-dam, please,’ he said. He liked to make a joke of his drinking. The barman poured him a brandy and water.
1973 S. Stander tr. of A.P. Brink’s Brandy in S. Afr. 3Tap-water. Pure tap-water. Now it’s ‘dop-en-dam’...Brandy and water, precisely half and half.
1974 To the Point 7 June 44It was dop and dam and a willing girl when we were young and green.
1974 G. Jenkins Bridge of Magpies (1977) 45He fiddled at a small mahogany bar. ‘Something to keep out the cold — a dop-en-dum (brandy and water)?’
1980 K.W. Kühne Informant, Bloemfontein, Free StateCollege is veiled in a nostalgic sort of ‘I remember, I remember..’, not least the dop-en-dam and fine discussions we had.
1989 F.G. Butler Tales from Old Karoo 30The farmer would have to..fetch them home for a couple of identical dop-en-dams.
1990 Personality 27 Aug. 12If a man walks into a pub now and asks for a dop and dam, they look at you as if you’re mad. You have to spell it out: ‘Brandy and water, you fool?’
A container or lid.
Any more-or-less bowl-shaped or spherical object, as a bowl, husk, shell, skull, etc.
Usually in pl. :Grape-skins, the residue which is left after grapes have been pressed for wine-making; doppie sense 1 b.
A brandy distilled from the grape-husks left after grapes have been pressed for wine-making, and usually aged in wood; Cape dop (see sense c below);
Any brandy;
Any spirituous drink. Also attributive.
With defining word, Cape dop:dop brandy, see sense 2 a i. Also attributive.
A drink; a quantity of alcohol; a ‘tot’ of spirits; doppie sense 3.
overdop,an extra quantity of wine given to workers under the tot system (see tot noun2 sense 2).
, tot system (see tot noun2 sense 2)
In the noun phrase dop en dam, also dop and dam, dop-en-dum, dop-’n-dam /ˌdɔpənˈdam/ [Afrikaans, dop brandy + en and + dam ‘dam’ i.e. water],(a drink of) brandy and water.
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dop system

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