Word.ws English Dictionary

clappety

clappety adjective: characterised by clapped or clapping sounds; clappy.

Adjective

clappety (not comparable)

  1. Characterised by clapped or clapping sounds; clappy.
    • […] and she'd got knockety hands, and clappety feet, and beadly eyes; and she was so straggle-toothed that you could see right down her gullet into the fires of hell.1935, William Makepeace Thackeray, The Cornhill Magazine, volume 151, page 114
    • At each landing, she stopped, looked and listened to the clappety clapp of the ample Miss Barry clanking her miserable way from step to step, until at long last they reached terra firma and had quite a time getting inside the building.1949, The Corset and Underwear Review, volume 73, page 189

Interjection

  1. A clapping sound.
    • Clappety-clappety-clappety clap, / We're having lots of fun. / Clappety-clappety-clappety clap. / Stop! Little hands, you're done.1975, Jeanne M. Machado, Early Childhood Experiences in Language Arts, page 84
    • Clappety, clappety, tap—the foxtrot reminded him of ragtime.2006, Anna Harwell Celenza, Gershwin's Rhapsody in Blue

Examples of clappety in a sentence

  • It seemed like I had only been asleep a short while, dreaming of Indians, when suddenly all the Indians came to life, clappety bang, with the clatter of hooves on the frozen ground.1968, Forest & Outdoors and Rod & Gun, volumes 70-71, page 17:
  • Your Riverbottom Nigras lived in little shotgun houses with a clappety porch and a swept dirt yard and a flowerbed neat as a flowered bonnet, bordered with green and amber bottles or fruitjars.1999, William Goyen, The House of Breath, page 25:

Forms of clappety

alternative formclappedy
alternative formclappity

Origin of clappety

From clap + -ety.

Questions about clappety

What does clappety mean?
Clappety means characterised by clapped or clapping sounds; clappy.
How do you use clappety in a sentence?
It seemed like I had only been asleep a short while, dreaming of Indians, when suddenly all the Indians came to life, clappety bang, with the clatter of hooves on the frozen ground.
What part of speech is clappety?
Clappety can be an adjective or an interjection.

Words near clappety in the dictionary

  1. clappers
  2. Clapperton
  3. Clappertons
  4. clappest
  5. clappeth
  6. clappety
  7. clappin'
  8. clapping
  9. clapping back
  10. clapping cheeks
  11. clapping eyes on

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: clappety (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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