palp

For verb: From French palper, from Latin palpare, palpari (“to stroke, touch softly, feel”).

For noun: From New Latin palpus (“a feeler”), from Latin palpare (“to stroke, touch softly, feel”).

• IPA^(key): /pælp/

palp (plural palps)

1. (zoology) A pedipalp, an appendage found near the mouth in invertebrates; has a variety of functions but is often primarily used for predating.
2. A fleshy part of a fingertip.
   • 1922, James Joyce, Ulysses:

     He folded his razor neatly and with stroking palps of fingers felt the smooth skin.

   • 1964, K. B. Gilden, Hurry Sundown

     The palps of her fingers itched, thickened, erected with the need to touch the bent head. Plunge into the dust-moted rough blackness of his hair, smooth back downward over the deep-brown nape of his neck.

   • 1984, W. Boyd, Stars & Bars i.i.11:

     With the palp of a forefinger he squeezed moisture from his wiry blond eyebrows.

   • 1998, Renny Christopher, Linda Strom, Lisa Orr, Working Class Studies: 1 & 2, Feminist Press at CUNY →ISBN, page 165

     When Mariuchi caresses the plant, for example, sensuously emitting from the palps of her fingers, a siren song.

   • 2008, John Gardner, Mickelsson's Ghosts, New Directions Publishing →ISBN, page 130

     He tested the blade against the palp of his thumb, then returned to the living room and decisively, scrape by scrape, cut away the hex sign, leaving a halo of ragged wood.

   • 2012, Sean Stewart, Star Wars: Dark Rendezvous, Random House →ISBN

     The bag seethed in her hand, not unpleasantly, as computational monofilaments shifted and flowed under her touch until they cradled the palps of her fingers.

3. (medicine, colloquial) Short for palpation.

   pain on palp

• (appendage): pedipalp

palp (third-person singular simple present palps, present participle palping, simple past and past participle palped)

1. To feel, to explore by touch.
   • 1982, Lawrence Durrell, Constance, Faber & Faber 2004 (Avignon Quintet), p. 729:

     It is not possible to examine a male patient without making him undress and actually palping him all over.

palp (not comparable)

1. (medicine, colloquial) Palpatory; obtained by palpation.

   palp blood pressure

• palpability
• palpable
• palpate
• palpation
• palpiform
• palpitate
• palpitation

• palp in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.
• palp in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• palp at OneLook Dictionary Search

• Appl., Lapp, appl., plap