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pap

1 American  
[pap] / pæp /

noun

  1. soft food for infants or invalids, as bread soaked in water or milk.

  2. an idea, talk, book, or the like, lacking substance or real value.

    Synonyms:
    twaddle, balderdash, drivel
pap 2 American  
[pap] / pæp /

noun

Chiefly Dialect.

  1. a teat; nipple.

  2. something resembling a teat or nipple.

pap 1 British  
/ pæp /

noun

  1. dialect a nipple or teat

    1. something resembling a breast or nipple, such as (formerly) one of a pair of rounded hilltops

    2. ( capital as part of a name )

      the Pap of Glencoe
"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
pap 2 British  
/ pæp /

noun

  1. any soft or semiliquid food, such as bread softened with milk, esp for babies or invalids; mash

  2. porridge made from maize

  3. worthless or oversimplified ideas; drivel

    intellectual pap
"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
pap 3 British  
/ pæp /

verb

  1. (of the paparazzi) to follow and photograph (a famous person)

"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

Other Word Forms

Etymology

Origin of pap1

1400–50; late Middle English; a nursery word akin to Dutch pap, German Pappe, Latin, Italian pappa

Origin of pap2

1150–1200; Middle English pappe; compare dialectal Norwegian, Swedish pappe, Latin papilla ( see papilla), Lithuanian pãpas, all from a base *pap- ; akin to pap 1

Vocabulary lists containing pap

Scrabble: Palindrome Words

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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.

Pap, as he liked to be called, presided as master of ceremonies.

From Slate • Jan. 13, 2026

HHS recommends women ages 21 through 65 get screened for cervical cancer with a Pap smear every three years.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 5, 2026

The man, identified only as Volodymyr Z, was detained under a European arrest warrant in the early hours of Tuesday in a town near Warsaw, his lawyer told Poland's Pap state news agency.

From BBC • Sep. 30, 2025

Pap smears are especially traumatic when providers fail to respond compassionately to patients’ pain.

From Salon • Jun. 9, 2025

He didn’t have no call at all to say Pap was a fool.

From "The Journey of Little Charlie" by Christopher Paul Curtis

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.