sb. colloq. [Imitative.]
1. (Often reduplicated zip, zip, or zip-zip.) A syllable expressing a light sharp sound such as that produced by a bullet or other small or slender object passing rapidly through the air or through some obstacle, or by the tearing of canvas or the like; a sound of this kind, or movement accompanied by such sound.
1875. Fogg, Arabistan, xxi. 264. The blood-thirsty zip of mosquitoes by the million.
1885. W. E. Goss, in Century Mag., May, 134/1. The ping, zip, zip of bullets.
1887. D. C. Murray, in Good Words, April, 249. The zip of the needle and swish of the thread went on.
1899. Kipling, Stalky, ii. 55. Another buckshot tore through the rotten canvas tilt with a vicious zipp.
2. fig. Energy, force, impetus.
1900. Lorimer, Old Gorgon Graham, xi. (1904), 225. I need … a little more zest for my food, and a little more zip about my work.
1907. N. Munro, Daft Days, xxxii. That’s how I feel … when I’ve got the zip of poetry in me.
So Zip v., intr. to make the sound expressed by ‘zip’ (chiefly in pr. pple. and vbl. sb.).
1881. J. M. Batten, Remin. Two Yrs. U.S. Navy, 72. I heard the zipping of bullets in the air close to my head.
1915. Stratton-Porter, M. O’Halloran, xix. [A snake] that would … coil zipping mad over the warm twisting body.
