Diaper | Webster's Dictionary (1865)

Di'a-per, n.

noun

n. [Fr. diaper, diaspre, jaspe, marbled, variegated, O. Fr. diaspre, Pr. diaspre, diaspe, Sp. diaspro, diaspero, It. diaspro, L. Lat. diasprus, diaspru, a kind of costly stuff, from Lat. jaspis, a green-colored precious stone. See JASPER.]

Sense 1. Figured linen cloth; a cloth woven in flowers or figures, much used for towels, napkins, &c.

Sense 2. A towel or napkin; an infant's breech-cloth.

Let one attend him with a silver basin, . . . Another bear the ewer, the third a diaper. Shak.

Sense 3. (Arch.) Paneling filled up with arabesque gilding and painting, or with carving or other wrought work in low relief.

Di'a-per, v. t.

verbtransitive

v. t. 1. To variegate or diversify with figures, as cloth; to flower. “Diapered with unwrought flowers.” Tennyson.

Sense 2. To put a diaper on, as a child.

Di'a-per, v. i.

verbintransitive

To draw flowers or figures, as upon cloth. “If you diaper on folds.” Peacham.