tamper

CEFRB2

/ˈtæm.pə(ɹ)/

verb · noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

Examples

At a glance

Sits at B2 on the CEFR scale

Deep Dive

Extra meanings

A tool used to tamp something down, such as tobacco in a pipe.
A railway vehicle used to tamp down ballast.
An envelope of neutron-reflecting material in a nuclear weapon, used to delay the expansion of the reacting material and thus produce a longer-lasting and more energetic explosion.

In context

The alarm had been tampered with and didn’t go off when it should have.
The election monitors found that a large number of ballots had been tampered with.
tamper detection

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Question 1 · Quick check

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The word in print, with each source given in full.

Our body is as a well-set clock which keeps good time; if it be too much or indiscreetly tamper’d with, the larum runs out before the houre.
1640, Joseph Hall, Christian Moderation, London: Nathaniel Butter, Book 1, § 7, p. 70
[…] of those Books that passe for authentick who knows what hath bin tamper’d withall, what hath bin raz’d out, what hath bin inserted […]
1641, John Milton, Of Reformation, Thomas Underhill, page 25
[…] a small steel pistol was concealed within the purse, the trigger of which was connected with the mounting, and made part of the machinery, so that the weapon would certainly be discharged, and in all probability its contents lodged in the person of any one, who, being unacquainted with the secret, should tamper with the lock which secured his treasure.
1817 December 31 (indicated as 1818), [Walter Scott], chapter VII, in Rob Roy. […], volume III, Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Archibald Constable and Co. […]; London: Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown, →OCLC, page 210
These extraordinary capacities of life have been ignored by the practitioners of chemical control who have brought to their task […] no humility before the vast forces with which they tamper.
1962, Rachel Carson, chapter 17, in Silent Spring, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 297
Ain't no use to fight it / Don't tamper with my destiny / Any way you slice it / I'm in the hands of fate, you see
1977, The Originals, “Been Decided”, in Down to Love Town

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From tamp + -er.