Etymology From Middle English clepen, clepien, from Old English cleopian, clipian (“to speak, cry out, call, summon, invoke, cry to, implore”), from Proto-Germanic *klipōną (“to ring, sound”), from Proto-Indo-European *gal- (“to sound”). Cognate with Old Frisian klippa, kleppa (“to ring”), Dutch kleppen (“to toll, chatter”), Middle Low German kleppen (“to strike, sound”), Middle Low German kleperen (“to rattle”).
She clepes him king of graues, & graue for kings, / Imperious ſupreme of all mortall things.1593, [William Shakespeare], Venus and Adonis, London: […] Richard Field, […], →OCLC, lines [995–996]:
See Borneo's sea-girt shore where ever flow / the perfumed liquor's thick and curded gouts, / the tears of forest-trees men "Camphor" clepe, / wherefore that Island crop of Fame shall reap.1880, Richard Francis Burton, Os Lusíadas, volume II, page 408:
1 more example
Boyden McNair, with his right elbow on his knee and his bent head resting on the hand which covered his eyes, sat near Wolfe's desk in the dunce's chair, yclept that by me on the day that District Attorney Anderson of Westchester sat in it while Wolfe made a dunce of him.1937, Rex Stout, chapter 8, in The Red Box:
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Dialectal, Often, With 'on' To tell lies about; inform against (someone).
You tried to mentor someone, teach them the basics of the trade, and they ran off to clype on you.2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 173:
Etymology From Middle English clepen, clepien, from Old English cleopian, clipian (“to speak, cry out, call, summon, invoke, cry to, implore”), from Proto-Germanic *klipōną (“to ring, sound”), from Proto-Indo-European *gal- (“to sound”). Cognate with Old Frisian klippa, kleppa (“to ring”), Dutch kleppen (“to toll, chatter”), Middle Low German kleppen (“to strike, sound”), Middle Low German kleperen (“to rattle”).
So bold was I to show my voice that night / With clepes, and cries, to fill the street throughout / With Creuse’ name in sorrow, with vain tears ; / And often-sithes the same for to repeat.a. 1547, “Virgil’s Æneid”, in Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, transl., edited by Geo. Fred. Nott, The Works of Henry Howard Earl of Surrey and of Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder, volume I, London: T. Bensley, published 1815, book II, page 124, lines 1021–1024: