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STALE
| Pronunciation (US): |  | (GB): | |
I. (adjective)
Sense 1
Meaning:
Lacking freshness, palatability, or showing deterioration from age
Example:
the beer was stale
Classified under:
Similar:
putrescent (becoming putrid)
putrid (in an advanced state of decomposition and having a foul odor)
corrupt; tainted (touched by rot or decay)
rotten (having decayed or disintegrated; usually implies foulness)
rancid ((used of decomposing oils or fats) having a rank smell or taste usually due to a chemical change or decomposition)
moldy; mouldy; musty (covered with or smelling of mold)
flyblown; maggoty (spoiled and covered with eggs and larvae of flies)
hard (dried out)
day-old (not fresh today)
cold (having lost freshness through passage of time)
bad; spoiled; spoilt ((of foodstuffs) not in an edible or usable condition)
addled ((of eggs) no longer edible)
Also:
old (of long duration; not new)
unoriginal (not original; not being or productive of something fresh and unusual)
Attribute:
staleness (having lost purity and freshness as a consequence of aging)
Antonym:
fresh (recently made, produced, or harvested)
Derivation:
staleness (having lost purity and freshness as a consequence of aging)
Sense 2
Meaning:
Lacking originality or spontaneity; no longer new
Example:
stale news
Synonyms:
cold; dusty; moth-eaten; stale
Classified under:
Similar:
unoriginal (not original; not being or productive of something fresh and unusual)
Derivation:
staleness (unoriginality as a result of being dull and hackneyed)
II. (verb)
Verb forms
Present simple: I / you / we / they stale ... he / she / it stales
Past simple: staled
Past participle: staled
-ing form: staling
Sense 1
Meaning:
Urinate, of cattle and horses
Classified under:
Verbs of grooming, dressing and bodily care
Hypernyms (to "stale" is one way to...):
make; make water; micturate; pass water; pee; pee-pee; piddle; piss; puddle; relieve oneself; spend a penny; take a leak; urinate; wee; wee-wee (eliminate urine)
Sentence frame:
Something ----s
Context examples:
Before commencing, it is but fair to warn you that the story will sound somewhat hackneyed in your ears; but stale details often regain a degree of freshness when they pass through new lips.
(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)
There was a smell of stale vegetables in the air.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
“I trust that age doth not wither nor custom stale my infinite variety,” said he, and I recognized in his voice the joy and pride which the artist takes in his own creation.
(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)
While he was so engaged, he asked me what I would take with it; and on my replying Half a pint of sherry, thought it a favourable opportunity, I am afraid, to extract that measure of wine from the stale leavings at the bottoms of several small decanters.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
The yeast has grown stale.
(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)
No sooner had the guest paid the usual stale compliments and bowed himself out, than Jenny, under pretense of asking an important question, informed Mr. Davis, the teacher, that Amy March had pickled limes in her desk.
(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)
"I can't smell anything else, except stale tobacco smoke," he announced.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
I was so young and childish, and so little qualified—how could I be otherwise? —to undertake the whole charge of my own existence, that often, in going to Murdstone and Grinby's, of a morning, I could not resist the stale pastry put out for sale at half-price at the pastrycooks' doors, and spent in that the money I should have kept for my dinner.
(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)
No, no; not that. It is something else. A stale, sickish smell.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
All the life about him—the odors of stale vegetables and soapsuds, the slatternly form of his sister, and the jeering face of Mr. Higginbotham—was a dream.
(Martin Eden, by Jack London)
