different between stir vs slither

English

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /st??/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /st?/
• Rhymes: -??(?)

Etymology 1

From Middle English stiren, sturien, from Old English styrian (“to be in motion, move, agitate, stir, disturb, trouble”), from Proto-Germanic *sturiz (“turmoil, noise, confusion”), related to Proto-Germanic *staurijan? (“to destroy, disturb”). Cognate with Old Norse styrr (“turmoil, noise, confusion”), German stören (“to disturb”), Dutch storen (“to disturb”).

Verb

stir (third-person singular simple present stirs, present participle stirring, simple past and past participle stirred)

1. (transitive) To incite to action

   Synonyms: arouse, instigate, prompt, excite; see also Thesaurus:incite
2. (transitive) To disturb the relative position of the particles of, a liquid of suchlike, by passing something through it

   Synonym: agitate
3. (transitive) To agitate the content of (a container), by passing something through it.

4. (transitive) To bring into debate; to agitate; to moot.
5. (transitive, dated) To change the place of in any manner; to move.
6. (intransitive) To move; to change one’s position.
7. (intransitive) To be in motion; to be active or bustling; to exert or busy oneself.
8. (intransitive) To become the object of notice; to be on foot.
9. (intransitive, poetic) To rise, or be up and about, in the morning.

   Synonyms: arise, get up, rouse; see also Thesaurus:wake

   • “Mid-Lent, and the Enemy grins,” remarked Selwyn as he started for church with Nina and the children. Austin, knee-deep in a dozen Sunday supplements, refused to stir; poor little Eileen was now convalescent from grippe, but still unsteady on her legs; her maid had taken the grippe, and now moaned all day: “Mon dieu! Mon dieu! Che fais mourir!”

For more quotations using this term, see Citations:stir.

Usage notes

• In all transitive senses except the dated one (“to change the place of in any manner”), stir is often followed by up with an intensive effect; as, to stir up fire; to stir up sedition.

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

stir (countable and uncountable, plural stirs)

1. The act or result of stirring (moving around the particles of a liquid etc.)

2. agitation; tumult; bustle; noise or various movements.
   • 1668, John Denham, Of Prudence (poem).

     Why all these words, this clamour, and this stir?

   • .

     Consider, after so much stir about genus and species, how few words we have yet settled definitions of.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:stir.
3. Public disturbance or commotion; tumultuous disorder; seditious uproar.
   • 1612, Sir John Davies, Discoverie of the True Causes why Ireland was never entirely subdued

     Being advertised of some stirs raised by his unnatural sons in England.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:stir.
4. Agitation of thoughts; conflicting passions.

Derived terms

• cause a stir
• stirless
• upstir

Translations

Etymology 2

From Romani stariben (“prison”), nominalisation of (a)star (“seize”), causative of ast (“remain”), probably from Sanskrit ???????? (?ti??hati, “stand or remain by”), from ??????? (ti??hati, “stand”).

Noun

stir (countable and uncountable, plural stirs)

1. (slang) Jail; prison.
   • 1928, Jack Callahan, Man's Grim Justice: My Life Outside the Law (page 42)

     Sing Sing was a tough joint in those days, one of the five worst stirs in the United States.

   • The Bat—they called him the Bat. […]. He'd never been in stir, the bulls had never mugged him, he didn't run with a mob, he played a lone hand, and fenced his stuff so that even the fence couldn't swear he knew his face.

Derived terms

• stir-crazy

Anagrams

• ISTR, RTIs, Rist, TRIS, TRIs, Tris, rits, sirt, tris, tris-

Danish

Verb

stir

1. imperative of stirre

English

Etymology

From Middle English slitheren, alteration of slideren (“to slither, creep”), from Old English slidrian (“to slip, slide, slither”), from Proto-West Germanic *slidr?n (“to slide, slither”), from Proto-Indo-European *sleyd?- (“to slip”), equivalent to slide +? -er (frequentative suffix). Cognate with Dutch slidderen (“to slip, wriggle, slither”), German schlittern (“to slither, skid”). More at slide.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?sl?ð.?(?)/
• Rhymes: -?ð?(r)

Verb

slither (third-person singular simple present slithers, present participle slithering, simple past and past participle slithered)

1. (intransitive) To move about smoothly and from side to side.
2. (intransitive) To slide
   • 2003, J. Flash, An American Savage

     I bent down and with both hands I scooped up as much of this pissshit as I could. The green and brown clump felt like Jello as it dripped down all over my clothes. It was slithering through inbetween my fingers.

Derived terms

• aslither
• slitherlink
• Slytherin

Related terms

Translations

Adjective

slither

1. (archaic) slithery; slippery

Noun

slither (uncountable)

1. A limestone rubble.
2. (nonstandard, see usage notes) A sliver.

Usage notes

The use of slither to mean sliver, which is prevalent especially in Britain (where th-fronting is becoming more and more prevalent), is considered by many to be an error, though at least one major dictionary merely labels it "informal" [1].

See also

• sliver

Anagrams

• Hirtles, Hitlers, Shitler, relisht