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Synonyms

cropper

American  
[krop-er] / ˈkrɒp ər /

noun

  1. a person or thing that crops.

  2. a person who raises a crop.

  3. a person who cultivates land for its owner in return for part of the crop; sharecropper.

  4. a plant that furnishes a crop.

  5. a cloth-shearing machine.

idioms

  1. come a cropper,

    1. to fail; be struck by some misfortune.

      His big deal came a cropper.

    2. to fall headlong, especially from a horse.

cropper British  
/ ˈkrɒpə /

noun

  1. a person who cultivates or harvests a crop

    1. a cutting machine for removing the heads from castings and ingots

    2. a guillotine for cutting lengths of bar or strip

  3. a machine for shearing the nap from cloth

  4. a plant or breed of plant that will produce a certain kind of crop under specified conditions

    a poor cropper on light land

  5. (often capital) a variety of domestic pigeon with a puffed-out crop

  6. informal

    1. to fall heavily

    2. to fail completely

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Etymology

Origin of cropper

First recorded in 1475–85; crop + -er 1

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

They have been held since in Baghdad's al-Karkh prison, once a US Army detention centre known as Camp Cropper, which is part of Baghdad airport's complex that has been subjected to repeated strikes.

From Barron's • Mar. 15, 2026

As well as a guitarist, Cropper was a prolific songwriter, and in addition to Dock of the Bay and In the Midnight Hour, he co-wrote Eddie Floyd's Knock on Wood.

From BBC • Dec. 3, 2025

Associate Eddie Gore told the AP he was with Cropper on Tuesday in Nashville, where he had been working on new music.

From BBC • Dec. 3, 2025

In 1998, “Coronation Street” viewers were introduced to Hayley Cropper, the first transgender character ever to appear on British television.

From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 5, 2024

The Michelson-Morley outcome became, in the words of William H. Cropper, "probably the most famous negative result in the history of physics."

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.