tripple, verb intransitive

/ˈtrɪp(ə)l/
Forms:
Also triple.
Origin:
See tripple noun.
Of a horse: to move at the ‘tripple’ pace.
1888 Cape Punch 6 June 125 (caption)A Horse Study. (The Stud Horses). Old Farmer: ‘My! But will they tripple!’
1899 G.H. Russell Under Sjambok 49Getting into their saddles, slowly trippled away (a kind of run, neither gallop, canter or trot), in the direction from which they had first arrived.
1900 S.T. Plaatje Boer War Diary (1973) 90He was tripelling very fast and as he is loath to turn quickly he ran plump into the wire fence.
1900 J.B. Atkins Relief of Ladysmith 80A scarcely intermitted line of Boers moved from left to right on their ponies, jogging, trotting, or trippling.
1903 Longman’s Mag. Dec. 151That easy hand canter usual in such Free State horses as do not tripple.
1931 F.C. Slater in Best of S. Afr. Short Stories (1991) 104That old grey mare..was a splendid piece of stuff. People used to laugh when they saw me trippling along on her.
1971 Farmer’s Weekly 11 Aug. 112Four year old gelding...Quiet to ride but willing. Can tripple.
1991 Weekend Post 13 Apr. (Leisure) 1I once heard him talk..about a horse..that could tripple. I didn’t know what he meant.
to move at the ‘tripple’ pace.
Derivatives:
So trippler  noun, a horse which is able to tripple; trippelaar; trippling  verbal noun and participial adjective.
1852 A.W. Cole Cape & Kafirs 259Since that event [he] had only ambled about on a ‘trippler’ warranted not to shy.
1875 J.J. Bisset Sport & War 192It was a grey, trippler, one of those rare horses of the Cape which amble along and carry you as if you were sitting in a chair.
1901 Field 9 Mar. 322The Boer never rides his horse at the trot, but at a quick walk or canter, and a step peculiar to the country and called ‘trippling’, or, as we should style it, ambling.
1905 Blackwood’s Mag. (U.K.) Oct. 526He could still hear the trippling patter of the other rider.
1910 A.B. Lamont Rural Reader 68A horse that has good qualities of wind and limb, and is a good pacer or ‘trippler’, is preferred as a riding horse by our farmers.
1924 L. Cohen Reminisc. of Jhb. 50Oom Piet..saddled his best trippler, and hurried into Johannesburg.
1937 C.R. Prance Tante Rebella’s Saga 67Oom Betje came out..ready to ride his ‘trippler’ Swartbooi from the Cape to Cairo for a sufficient bet.
1950 D. Reed Somewhere S. of Suez 221For the present the Basuto remains a free man and proud. He is a figure of dignity in his blanket and plaited straw hat, on his tripling pony.
1958 S. Cloete Mask 182Only the shuffle of the trippling horses’ unshod hoofs broke the stillness of Africa.
1963 S. Cloete Rags of Glory 145I got good ones, real Boer ponies. Two tripplers. All about fifteen hands.
1966 I. Vaughan These Were my Yesterdays 49I will buy you a nice little trippling horse and you can learn to drive the Buick.
1991 Best of S. Afr. Short Stories (Reader’s Digest Assoc.) 104A trippling horse moves both left legs and both right legs alternately, unlike the more bumpy trot, when diagonally opposite legs move together.
1991 Weekend Post 13 Apr. (Leisure) 1Trippling is not a natural gait.
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18521991

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trippler
trippling

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