# reap

Pronunciation: say "REEP" US /ɹip/, UK /ɹiːp/

## Verb

1. To obtain or receive something as a reward for what one has done, whether the outcome is good or bad.
   - Simple: To get something good or bad as a result of what you have done.
   - _Companies that invested early in solar power now reap large profits._
   - _The coach's harsh methods reaped nothing but resentment from his players._
2. To gather a crop, such as a harvest, by cutting it.
   - Simple: To cut and collect a crop when it is ready.
   - _The farmers raced to reap the wheat before the fall rains arrived._
   - _By the end of the week they had reaped the whole barley harvest from the valley fields._
3. To cut grain or a similar crop with a sickle, scythe or reaping machine.
   - Simple: To cut grain or a similar plant with a curved blade or a machine.
   - _Modern combines reap and thresh the wheat in a single pass._
   - _The old man still reaps his small rye field with a scythe every summer._
5. To terminate a child process that has already exited, so that it is removed from the process table.
   - Simple: To fully end a finished task that another program started, so it is taken off the computer's list.
   - _A well-written server calls waitpid() in a loop to reap any children that have exited._
   - _The shell reaped the finished background job before printing the next prompt._

## Noun

4. A bundle of grain; a handful of cut grain laid down by the reaper as the cutting goes on.
   - Simple: A bundle or handful of grain left on the ground as it is cut.
   - _She gathered each reap into her arms and tied it with a twist of straw._
   - _By noon the field was dotted with reaps waiting to be bound into sheaves._

## Verb

6. To remove the beard from; to shave. *(obsolete)*
   - Simple: To cut off a man's beard, or to shave.

## Origin

From Middle English repen, from Old English rēopan, rēpan, variants of rīpan "to reap", from Proto-West Germanic *rīpan and Proto-Germanic *rīpaną (compare Norwegian ripa, "to score, scratch"), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁reyb- "to snatch".

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/reap (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).