Etymology: This, and the verb of same form, appear in the 14th cent. Priority in time is given by quots. to the noun, the etymological priority of which is also favoured by their general tenor. From an early date the form claspe varies with clapse (still used in southern dialects), but the evidence fails to show which is the original. No trace of either form is found outside English; and the origin is entirely a matter of conjecture. Senses 1, 2 appear to have been the source of the verb, and senses 3, 4, 5, 6 in turn to have been influenced by or wholly taken from the verb.The noun in its latter part recalls hasp n., or hapse (Old English hæpse , Old Norse hespe a clasp, or fastening); also Middle Low German and Middle Dutch gaspe , gespe , Dutch gesp , clasp, buckle. (Wedgwood suggests direct imitation of the sound of a metal fastening, as when we speak of the snap of a bracelet.) Whether clapse (if this were the original form) could be formed in some way from, or influenced by, clip v.¹ (Old English clyppan) to embrace, complecti, amplecti, appears doubtful, inasmuch as this meaning is little applicable to the primary senses of the noun, and appears to have been a later development in the verb, whence it was taken back into later senses of the noun.

Etymology: Acronym < the initial letters of Consortium of Local Authorities Special Programme.Other expansions of the title are recorded (see quot. 1958).

Etymology: See clasp n.¹Senses 1, 2, 3 appear to be directly < clasp n.¹; senses 4, 5, 6, 7 appear to be developed from these, perhaps under influence of clip v.¹ to embrace (complecti, amplecti) which clasp has in modern use to a great extent superseded; and we may suspect in this development some association with grasp, so that ‘clasp’ came to be ‘to grasp clipping’.