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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. n. A backless and armless single seat supported on legs or a pedestal.
  2. n. A low bench or support for the feet or knees in sitting or kneeling, as a footrest.
  3. n. A toilet seat; a commode.
  4. n. Fecal matter from a single bowel movement.
  5. n. Botany A stump or rootstock that produces shoots or suckers.
  6. n. Botany A shoot or growth from such a stump or rootstock.
  7. v. Botany To send up shoots or suckers.
  8. v. To evacuate the bowels; defecate.
  9. v. Slang To act as a stool pigeon.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. n. A seat or chair; now, in particular, a seat, whether high or low, consisting of a piece of wood mounted usually on three or four legs, and without a back, intended for one person; also, any support of like construction used as a rest for the feet, or for the knees when kneeling.
  2. n. The seat of a bishop; a see.
  3. n. Same as ducking-stool.
  4. n. The seat used in easing the bowels; hence, a fecal evacuation; a discharge from the bowels.
  5. n. A frame for tapestry-work.
  6. n. The root or stump of a timber-tree, or of a bush, cane, grass, etc., which throws up shoots; also, the cluster of shoots thus produced.
  7. n. The mother plant from which young plants are propagated by the process of layering.
  8. n. Nautical: A small channel in the side of a vessel for the deadeyes of the backstays.
  9. n. An ornamental block placed over the stem to support a poop-lantern.
  10. n. A movable pole or perch to which a pigeon is fastened as a lure or decoy for wild birds. See the extract under stool-pigeon, 1.
  11. n. Hence A stool-pigeon; also, a decoy-duck.
  12. n. Material spread on the bottom for oysterspat to cling to; set, either natural or artificial. See Cultch.
  13. n. (See also camp-stool, footstool, night-stool, piano-stool.)
  14. To throw up shoots from the root, as a grass or a grain-plant; form a stool. See stool, n., 6.
  15. To decoy duck or other fowl by means of stools.
  16. To be decoyed; respond to a decoy.
  17. To evacuate the bowels.
  18. To plow; cultivate.
  19. n. In wooden ships, one of the pieces of plank bolted to the quarters for the purpose of forming and erecting the galleries; also, one of the ornamental blocks for the poop lanterns to stand on abaft.
  20. n. In iron ship-building, a small foundation or seating for the support of some part of the machinery, as the shaft-bearings, pumps, etc.

Wiktionary

  1. n. A seat for one person without a back or armrest.
  2. n. A footstool.
  3. n. Feces; excrement.
  4. n. A decoy.

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. n. A plant from which layers are propagated by bending its branches into the soil.
  2. v. To ramfy; to tiller, as grain; to shoot out suckers.
  3. n. A single seat with three or four legs and without a back, made in various forms for various uses.
  4. n. A seat used in evacuating the bowels; hence, an evacuation; a discharge from the bowels.
  5. n. A stool pigeon, or decoy bird.
  6. n. A small channel on the side of a vessel, for the dead-eyes of the backstays.
  7. n. A bishop's seat or see; a bishop-stool.
  8. n. A bench or form for resting the feet or the knees; a footstool.
  9. n. Material, such as oyster shells, spread on the sea bottom for oyster spat to adhere to.

WordNet 3.0

  1. n. a simple seat without a back or arms
  2. v. react to a decoy, of wildfowl
  3. n. (forestry) the stump of a tree that has been felled or headed for the production of saplings
  4. v. grow shoots in the form of stools or tillers
  5. n. a plumbing fixture for defecation and urination
  6. v. have a bowel movement
  7. v. lure with a stool, as of wild fowl
  8. n. solid excretory product evacuated from the bowels

Etymologies

  1. Middle English, from Old English stōl; see stā- in Indo-European roots.

Examples

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Lists

These user-created lists contain the word ‘stool’.

Comments

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  • qroqqa 'Now I'll tell you a secret. Lady Chestrum and I don't always hit it; she has such odd fancies. Would you believe it? she is every now and then for hearing me my Catechism. I take physic to please her twice a week; and if I have not stools enough, I must have another dose.'
    —Robert Bage, 1796, Hermsprong

    I know even the late eighteenth century is not the time of Jane Austen, but I goggled at this and had to read it repeatedly to convince myself it said what it did. This is a meeting in polite society between a brainless, shiftless aristocrat and a refined, shy young lady he is trying to persuade of his merits as a future husband. And he is discussing the quantity of his stools. Mar 21, 2009

  • yarb                  On
    an alloy stool towards late afternoon
    I spin with, under me, coiled-round chrome,
    legs belonging to one quite elsewhere.

    - Peter Reading, Almshouse, from For the Municipality's Elderly, 1974 Jun 22, 2008

‘stool’ has been looked up 1828 times, added to 7 lists, commented on 2 times, and has a Scrabble score of 5.