damper

• (US) enPR: dămp′ər, IPA^(key): /ˈdæmpɚ/

• Audio (General Australian):

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• Audio (UK, male voice):

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• Rhymes: -æmpə(ɹ)

From damp (verb) +‎ -er.

The name of the type of bread is first attested in 1825, and originally likely refers to damping the appetite.^[1]

damper (countable and uncountable, plural dampers)

1. Something that damps or checks:
   1. A valve or movable plate in the flue or other part of a stove, furnace, etc., used to check or regulate the draught of air.
   2. A contrivance (sordine), as in a pianoforte, to deaden vibrations; or, as in other pieces of mechanism, to check some action at a particular time.
   3. Something that kills the mood.
      • 1887, William Black, Sabina Zembra:

        Nor did Sabrina′s presence seem to act as any damper at the modest little festivities.

   4. A device that decreases the oscillations of a system.
   6. (mechanical engineering) A shock absorber.
      • 1960 December, “The first hundred 25 kV a.c. electric locomotives for B.R.”, in Trains Illustrated, page 726:

        In general, steel springs were stipulated for primary suspension, although rubber was accepted for auxiliary springing; hydraulic dampers were specified and the use of laminated springs ruled out.

      • 2022 September 21, Ben Jones, “IC225s: the Electras go gliding on”, in RAIL, number 966, page 40:

        However, complaints quickly surfaced about the ride quality of the SIG BT41 bogies, which was only cured by the fitting of additional dampers to the bogies and couplers.

3. (countable, uncountable, chiefly New Zealand, Australia) Bread made from a basic recipe of flour, water, milk, and salt, but without yeast.
   • 1827, Peter Cunningham, Two Years in New South Wales, ii.190, quoted in G. A. Wilkes, A Dictionary of Australian Colloquialisms, 1978, →ISBN,

     The farm-men usually bake their flour into flat cakes, which they call dampers, and cook these in the ashes.

   • 1902, Barbara Baynton, edited by Sally Krimmer and Alan Lawson, Bush Studies (Portable Australian Authors: Barbara Baynton), St Lucia: University of Queensland Press, published 1980, page 15:

     The flour bespattering Squeaker's now neglected clothes spoke eloquently of his clumsy efforts at damper making.

   • 1938, William Ferguson, John Patten, “Aborigines Claim Citizen Rights!”, in Anita Heiss, Peter Minter, editors, Macquarie PEN Anthology of Aboriginal Literature, Allen & Unwin, published 2008, page 31:

     You hypocritically claim that you are trying to ‘protect’ us; but your modern policy of ‘protection’ (so-called) is killing us off just as surely as the pioneer policy of giving us poisoned damper and shooting us down like dingoes!

4. (UK, slang, obsolete) A shop till.
   • 1853, Joseph Kay, The Condition and Education of Poor Children in English and in German Towns, page 20:

     A certain class of 'City Arabs' do nothing but steal provisions from shop doors and sell them for one-tenth of their value, or less, […] while a fourth again do nothing but "draw the dampers," i. e. steal from shop-tills.

From damp (adjective) +‎ -er.

damper

1. comparative form of damp: more damp

• “damper”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

• deramp, ramped

A calque of the English steamer.

damper c (singular definite damperen, plural indefinite dampere)

1. steamer, steamboat, steamship

• dampskib

See dampe.

damper

1. present of dampe

• “damper” in Den Danske Ordbog

From damp +‎ -er.

damper m (definite singular damperen, indefinite plural dampere, definite plural damperne)

1. a steamer (steamship, steamboat)

• dampbåt, dampskip

• hjuldamper

damper m

1. indefinite plural of damp

damper

1. present of dampe

• dampar (Nynorsk)

• “damper” in The Bokmål Dictionary.

From English dumper.

damper (definite accusative damperi, plural damperler)

1. dump truck, dumper

From English damper.

damper (definite accusative damperi, plural damperler)

1. This term needs a translation to English. Please help out and add a translation, then remove the text {{rfdef}}.

• Çağbayır, Yaşar (2007) “damper”, in Ötüken Türkçe Sözlük (in Turkish), volume 1, Istanbul: Ötüken Neşriyat, page 1095