Etymology 1

Old English læppa (skirt or flap of a garment), from , confer Middle Dutch lappe, Old High German lappa, German Lappen, Old Norse .

Noun

1. The loose part of a coat; the lower part of a garment that plays loosely; a skirt; an apron.
2. An edge; a border; a hem, as of cloth.
3. The part of the clothing that lies on the knees or thighs when one sits down; that part of the person thus covered; figuratively, a place of rearing and fostering; as, to be reared in the lap of luxury.
4. The upper legs of a seated person.

   The boy was sitting on his mother's lap

5. , The female pudenda.
6. component that overlaps or covers any portion of the same or adjacent component.

Etymology 2

From lappen "to fold, wrap" from earlier wlappen "to fold, wrap" from *wlappan, wlæppan, wlappian "to wrap" from from . Akin to dial. vravle "to wind", Old goluppare "to wrap, fold up" (from ). More at envelop, develop

The sense of "to get a lap ahead (of someone) on a track" is from 1847, on notion of "overlapping." The noun meaning "a turn around a track" (1861) is from this sense.

Verb

1. to fold, wrap
2. to wrap around, enwrap, wrap up

   to lap a bandage around a finger

3. to envelop, enfold

   lapped in luxury

4. to wind around
5. To place or lay (something) so as to overlap another.

   One laps roof tiles so that water can run off.

6. To polish, e.g., a surface, until smooth.
7. To lie partly on or over something; to overlap.
8. To overtake a straggler in a race by completing one more lap than them.

Noun

1. the act or process of lapping
2. That part of any substance or fixture which extends over, or lies upon, or by the side of, a part of another; as, the lap of a board; also, the measure of such extension over or upon another thing.
3. The amount by which a slide valve at its half stroke overlaps a port in the seat, being equal to the distance the valve must move from its mid stroke position in order to begin to open the port. Used alone, lap refers to outside lap. See Outside lap (below).
4. The state or condition of being in part extended over or by the side of something else; or the extent of the overlapping; as, the second boat got a lap of half its length on the leader.
5. One circuit around a race track, or one traversal down and then back the length of a pool; as, to run twenty laps; to win by three laps, to swim two laps.
6. In card playing and other games, the points won in excess of the number necessary to complete a game; — so called when they are counted in the score of the following game.
7. A sheet, layer, or bat, of cotton fiber prepared for the carding machine.
8. A piece of brass, lead, or other soft metal, used to hold a cutting or polishing powder in cutting glass, gems, and the like, or in polishing cutlery, etc. It is usually in the form of wheel or disk, which revolves on a vertical axis.

Etymology 3

From Old English lapian, from Proto Germanic }, akin to Old High German laffen (to lick), Old Norse , Danish , Old Saxon lepil, German Löffel (spoon). Cognate with Latin . French is a loanword from German. Cf. Danish , dialect German .