Clasp

How to spell clasp

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce clasp

What does clasp mean?

1. nounA small metal or plastic fastening that holds two things or two ends securely together.
2. verbTo hold something tightly in the hands or to fasten something with a clip or hook.

Clasp in a sentence

• noun

  The clasp on her necklace had come loose during the journey.

• verb

  She would clasp the railing firmly whenever the bus lurched forward.

• noun

  He replaced the broken clasp on the old leather briefcase.

• verb

  He liked to clasp his hands together while waiting for news.

Where does clasp come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Clasp comes from Middle English, where it first appears around the 1300s as 'claspe', and earlier still as 'clapse', a form in which the 'p' and 's' were swapped. That switching of two sounds, called metathesis, is the same kind of jumble that turned 'brid' into 'bird', and it explains why the modern spelling stacks the cluster 's-p' at the end. Its ultimate origin is genuinely uncertain; no clear parent in Old English or Old Norse has been pinned down, though most scholars assume a native Germanic source connected to the idea of gripping or fastening. From the start it carried both the meaning of a metal hook that holds something shut and the action of grasping firmly with the hands. Because it has always meant a tight hold, the doubled idea of fingers closing and metal locking has stayed bundled in the one short word.

How the word is built

• clasp (single Middle English root, no separable prefix or suffix)