Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Slang Excessively sentimental; mawkish.
  • adjective Slang Silly or foolish.
  • adjective Full of sap.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Abounding with sap; juicy; succulent.
  • Not firm; weak; foolish; silly; sap-headed.
  • Softened by putrefaction.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • adjective Abounding with sap; full of sap; juicy; succulent.
  • adjective Hence, young, not firm; weak, feeble.
  • adjective Low Weak in intellect.
  • adjective (Bot.) Abounding in sap; resembling, or consisting largely of, sapwood.
  • adjective obsolete Musty; tainted.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective obsolete musty; tainted
  • adjective US Excessively sweet, emotional, nostalgic; cheesy; mushy. (British equivalent: soppy)
  • adjective Having sap or having to do with sap.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective ludicrous, foolish
  • adjective abounding in sap

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

Compare Latin sapere to taste.

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Examples

  • For two reasons: one, as I mentioned, I wrote this as a way to heal, and the last thing I wanted was to get bogged down in sappy emotion.

    Writer Unboxed » Blog Archive » INTERVIEW: Allison Winn Scotch 2007

  • The reason I feel sappy is because I am absurdly touched by the invitation, considering my stepbrother and I watched our friendship crumble into nothing when it was systematically assaulted by familial forces.

    Archive 2004-04-01 Dean Francis Alfar 2004

  • The reason I feel sappy is because I am absurdly touched by the invitation, considering my stepbrother and I watched our friendship crumble into nothing when it was systematically assaulted by familial forces.

    notes from the peanut gallery Dean Francis Alfar 2004

  • Tacked on to the scaffolding of the unproduced play, Cap’n Simon Wheeler, The Amateur Detective, this enigmatic, dream-ridden fantasy involves a young man who travels three days on horseback from Kentucky to a small Missouri town with the intention of shooting to death a cousin, who is described as sappy, sentimental, giddy, and thoughtless, to settle a family feud.

    Mark Twain Ron Powers 2005

  • Tacked on to the scaffolding of the unproduced play, Cap’n Simon Wheeler, The Amateur Detective, this enigmatic, dream-ridden fantasy involves a young man who travels three days on horseback from Kentucky to a small Missouri town with the intention of shooting to death a cousin, who is described as sappy, sentimental, giddy, and thoughtless, to settle a family feud.

    Mark Twain Ron Powers 2005

  • Awww, Arnold is jealous that he doesn't get enough attention in sappy. mp3!

    Economic Elitism Thought Experiment, Arnold Kling | EconLog | Library of Economics and Liberty 2009

  • He said he saw at some checkpoints that some members of the Afghan police force had taken the breast plates, the so called sappy plates, out of their body armor and were using it to grill meat on.

    CNN Transcript Dec 1, 2009 2009

  • It's kevlar on the insides, stop small arms fire, a couple of what are called sappy (ph) plates in the front and back.

    CNN Transcript Oct 22, 2006 2006

  • It's kevlar on the insides, stop small arms fire, a couple of what are called sappy (ph) plates in the front and back.

    CNN Transcript Oct 21, 2006 2006

  • There is a vulgar pretentiousness about what we may call the sappy style of work which is very undesirable.

    Scientific American, Volume XXIV., No. 12, March 18, 1871 A Weekly Journal of Practical Information, Art, Science, Mechanics, Chemistry, and Manufactures. Various

Comments

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  • I guess you think you know this story.

    You don't. The real one's much more gory.

    The phoney one, the one you know,

    Was cooked up years and years ago,

    And made to sound all soft and sappy

    just to keep the children happy.

    - Roald Dahl, 'Cinderella'.

    August 8, 2009

  • Sad and Happy at the same time?

    January 29, 2011