Coined 1925 by B.F. Goodrich from 'zip' (the sound it makes) — a brand name that became the standard word.
Definition
A device consisting of two flexible strips of metal or plastic with interlocking projections closed or opened by pulling a slide along them.
The Full Story
English1925well-attested
From 'zip' (the sound of swift movementthrough air) + the agent/instrument suffix '-er.' The word 'zip' is onomatopoeic, imitating the sharp hissing sound made by a bullet, an arrow, or any object moving quickly through air — first recorded in English in the 1850s. The name 'zipper' wascoined by the B.F. Goodrich Company
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'Zipper' is purely onomatopoeic — it imitates thesound the device makes. Different languages named the same device by different metaphors: German 'Reißverschluss' (tear-closure), French 'fermeture éclair' (lightning closure), Japanese 'jippā' (borrowed from English). The device wasinvented in 1893, improved in 1917, butonly
that incorporated Gideon Sundback's hookless slide fastener. Sundback, a Swedish-American engineer, had patented his improved 'Separable Fastener' in 1917 after
— and began using it as a trade name for the boot. The name rapidly transferred from the boot to the fastening mechanism, and by the 1930s 'zipper' had become the generic English word for any slide fastener. The '-er' suffix follows the standard English pattern of forming instrument nouns. The word is a rare example of a brand name achieving complete genericisation within a decade of coinage — joining 'hoover,' 'velcro,' and 'escalator' in that select group of trade names absorbed entirely into common language. Key roots: zip (English (onomatopoeic): "the sound of fast movement").