Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An apparatus in which electricity or a fuel is used to furnish heat, as for cooking or warmth.
  • noun A device that produces heat for specialized, especially industrial, purposes.
  • noun A kiln.
  • noun Chiefly British A hothouse.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • In wool-bleaching, to expose (woolen yarn or cloth) in a dampened condition to the fumes of burning sulphur, and hence to the action of sulphurous acid, in a closed, usually wooden, building. The same treatment is sometimes applied to silk.
  • To heat in a stove or heated room; expose to moderate heat in a vessel.
  • To heat in or as in a stove: as, to stove feathers; to stove printed fabrics (to fix the color); to stove ropes (to make them pliable); to stove timber.
  • In vinegar-manuf., to expose (malt-wash, etc.) in casks to artificial heat in a close room, in order to induce acetous fermentation.
  • In ceramics, to expose to a low heat. See pottery, porcelain, and kiln.
  • To cook in a close vessel; stew.
  • To shut up, as in a stove; inclose; confine.
  • Preterit and past participle of stave.
  • noun A room, chamber, or house artificially warmed. [Obsolete except in the specific uses , , below.]
  • noun Specifically— In horticulture, a glazed and artificially heated building for the culture of tender plants: the same as a greenhouse or hot house, except that the stove maintains a higher temperature—not lower than 60° F. See greenhouse, hothouse, and dry-stove.
  • noun A drying-chamber, as for plants, extracts, conserves, etc.; also, a highly heated drying-room, used in various manufactures.
  • noun A place for taking either liquid or vapor baths; a bath-house or bath-room.
  • noun A closed or partly closed vessel or receiver in which fuel is burned, the radiated heat being utilized for warming a room or for cooking.
  • noun In coram., a pottery-kiln.
  • noun In a furnace, the oven in which the blast is heated.
  • noun In bookbinding, an apparatus with which the finisher heats his tools, formerly made to burn charcoal, but latterly gas.
  • noun to a kind of fireplace with back and sides of ironwork and some arrangement for heating the air in chambers which communicate with the room.
  • noun A chamber in which hides are dehaired.
  • noun A stove having a tank or reservoir for hot water.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun A house or room artificially warmed or heated; a forcing house, or hothouse; a drying room; -- formerly, designating an artificially warmed dwelling or room, a parlor, or a bathroom, but now restricted, in this sense, to heated houses or rooms used for horticultural purposes or in the processes of the arts.
  • noun An apparatus, consisting essentially of a receptacle for fuel, made of iron, brick, stone, or tiles, and variously constructed, in which fire is made or kept for warming a room or a house, or for culinary or other purposes.
  • noun An appliance having a top surface with fittings suitable for heating pots and pans for cooking, frying, or boiling food, most commonly heated by gas or electricity, and often combined with an oven in a single unit; a cooking stove. Such units commonly have two to six heating surfaces, called burners, even if they are heated by electricity rather than a gas flame.
  • noun a stove with an oven, opening for pots, kettles, and the like, -- used for cooking.
  • noun See under Dry.
  • noun See under Foot.
  • noun See in the Vocabulary.
  • noun (Bot.) a plant which requires artificial heat to make it grow in cold or cold temperate climates.
  • noun thin iron castings for the parts of stoves.
  • imp. of stave.
  • transitive verb To keep warm, in a house or room, by artificial heat.
  • transitive verb To heat or dry, as in a stove.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • verb Simple past tense and past participle of stave.
  • noun A heater, a closed apparatus to burn fuel for the warming of a room.
  • noun A device for heating food, (UK) a cooker.
  • noun chiefly UK A hothouse (in which plants are kept).
  • verb transitive To heat or dry, as in a stove.
  • verb transitive To keep warm, in a house or room, by artificial heat.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun any heating apparatus
  • noun a kitchen appliance used for cooking food

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Middle English, heated room, probably from Middle Low German or Middle Dutch, both probably from Vulgar Latin *extūfa, from *extūfāre, to heat with steam; see stew.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Middle Dutch, from Middle Low German, from Old High German stubā, stupā ("heated room"), from Proto-Germanic *stubō (“room, living room, heated room”). Cognate with Old English stofa, stofu ("bathroom, bathhouse"), Old Norse stofa (whence Icelandic stofa ("living room"), Norwegian stove and Danish and Norwegian stue).

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word stove.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.