Wraps

How to spell wraps

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce wraps

What does wraps mean?

1. verbCovers or encloses something by folding or winding material around it (third-person singular).
2. nounPlural of wrap: rolled flatbread meals, or loose outer garments such as shawls.

Wraps in a sentence

• verb

  She carefully wraps each fragile glass in bubble film before posting it.

• noun

  The lunch menu lists three chicken wraps alongside the usual sandwiches.

• verb

  The deli worker wraps the sandwich tightly in greaseproof paper.

• noun

  She packed two woollen wraps for the chilly evenings on the coast.

Where does wraps come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

The base word 'wrap' first appears in Middle English around the 1300s as 'wrappen', meaning to wind, fold, or cover something by drawing material around it. Its ultimate origin is genuinely uncertain, but scholars suspect a North Germanic or Low German source, since related Scandinavian forms carry the sense of twisting or rolling cloth. From the start the word kept its very concrete meaning of enclosing something in a covering, and that physical sense never really drifted. The plural noun 'wraps' later came to name both loose outer garments, such as a shawl or stole, and, much more recently, rolled flatbread meals. The spelling trap is the silent initial 'w', a leftover from an older pronunciation that English stopped sounding centuries ago, which is exactly why 'wraps' is so easily confused with its homophone 'raps'.

How the word is built

• wrap (to cover by winding or folding)
• -s (plural noun / third-person verb ending)