HARP

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does harp mean? 

• HARP (noun)
  The noun HARP has 3 senses:

1. a chordophone that has a triangular frame consisting of a sounding board and a pillar and a curved neck; the strings stretched between the neck and the soundbox are plucked with the fingers

2. a pair of curved vertical supports for a lampshade

3. a small rectangular free-reed instrument having a row of free reeds set back in air holes and played by blowing into the desired hole

  Familiarity information: HARP used as a noun is uncommon.

• HARP (verb)
  The verb HARP has 2 senses:

1. come back to

2. play the harp

  Familiarity information: HARP used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• HARP (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

A chordophone that has a triangular frame consisting of a sounding board and a pillar and a curved neck; the strings stretched between the neck and the soundbox are plucked with the fingers

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("harp" is a kind of...):

chordophone (a stringed instrument of the group including harps, lutes, lyres, and zithers)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "harp"):

aeolian harp; aeolian lyre; wind harp (a harp having strings tuned in unison; they sound when wind passes over them)

lyre (a harp used by ancient Greeks for accompaniment)

Derivation:

harp (play the harp)

harpist (someone who plays the harp)

Sense 2

Meaning:

A pair of curved vertical supports for a lampshade

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Hypernyms ("harp" is a kind of...):

support (any device that bears the weight of another thing)

Sense 3

Meaning:

A small rectangular free-reed instrument having a row of free reeds set back in air holes and played by blowing into the desired hole

Classified under:

Nouns denoting man-made objects

Synonyms:

harmonica; harp; mouth harp; mouth organ

Hypernyms ("harp" is a kind of...):

free-reed instrument (a wind instrument with a free reed)

Derivation:

harp (play the harp)

harpist (someone who plays the harp)

• HARP (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they harp    ... he / she / it harps   
Past simple: harped   
Past participle: harped   
-ing form: harping   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Come back to

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

dwell; harp

Context example:

She is always harping on the same old things

Hypernyms (to "harp" is one way to...):

ingeminate; iterate; reiterate; repeat; restate; retell (to say, state, or perform again)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s PP

Sense 2

Meaning:

Play the harp

Classified under:

Verbs of sewing, baking, painting, performing

Context example:

She harped the Saint-Saens beautifully

Hypernyms (to "harp" is one way to...):

play (perform music on (a musical instrument))

"Harp" entails doing...:

pick off; pluck; pull off; tweak (pull or pull out sharply)

Domain category:

music (musical activity (singing or whistling etc.))

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s

Derivation:

harp (a small rectangular free-reed instrument having a row of free reeds set back in air holes and played by blowing into the desired hole)

harp (a chordophone that has a triangular frame consisting of a sounding board and a pillar and a curved neck; the strings stretched between the neck and the soundbox are plucked with the fingers)

harper (someone who plays the harp)

 Context examples 

He did not touch her, or the chair from which she had risen, but sat himself near the harp.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

"Where's the jew's-harp, Jo?" cried Laurie, as soon as he was within speaking distance.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

Two play on the pianoforte, and one on the harp; and all sing, or would sing if they were taught, or sing all the better for not being taught; or something like it.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

He is a harmless enough fellow, Parker by name, a garroter by trade, and a remarkable performer upon the jew’s-harp.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The jongleur had put down his harp in high dudgeon.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

If I were Mr. Van Weyden, who harps eternally on questions of right and wrong, I’d ask, by what right do you live when you do nothing to deserve living?

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

If Saul could have had you for his David, the evil spirit would have been exorcised without the aid of the harp.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

And we agreed it would be best to have the harp, for it seems to amuse her more than the piano-forte.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

The second course was two ducks trussed up in the form of fiddles; sausages and puddings resembling flutes and hautboys, and a breast of veal in the shape of a harp.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

He was a harp; all life that he had known and that was his consciousness was the strings; and the flood of music was a wind that poured against those strings and set them vibrating with memories and dreams.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)