different between tell vs stell

English

Pronunciation

• (UK, US) enPR: t?l, IPA^(key): /t?l/, /t??/
• Rhymes: -?l

Etymology 1

From Middle English tellen (“to count, tell”), from Old English tellan (“to count, tell”), from Proto-Germanic *taljan?, *talzijan? (“to count, enumerate”), from Proto-Germanic *tal?, *tal? (“number, counting”), from Proto-Indo-European *dol- (“calculation, fraud”). Cognate with Saterland Frisian tälle (“to say; tell”), West Frisian telle (“to count”), West Frisian fertelle (“to tell, narrate”), Dutch tellen (“to count”), Low German tellen (“to count”), German zählen, Faroese telja. More at tale.

Verb

tell (third-person singular simple present tells, present participle telling, simple past and past participle told)

1. (transitive, archaic outside of idioms) To count, reckon, or enumerate.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, II.vii:

     And in his lap a masse of coyne he told, / And turned vpsidowne, to feede his eye / A couetous desire with his huge threasury.

   • 1875, Hugh MacMillan, The Sunday Magazine:

     Only He who made them can tell the number of the stars, and mark the place of each in the order of the one great dominant spiral.

2. (transitive) To narrate.
   • 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)

     Tell her you’re here.

3. (transitive) To convey by speech; to say.
4. (transitive) To instruct or inform.
   • 1611, Bible (King James Version), Genesis xii. 18

     Why didst thou not tell me that she was thy wife?
5. (transitive) To order; to direct, to say to someone.
   • 1909, H. G. Wells, Ann Veronica

     She said she hoped she had not distressed him by the course she had felt obliged to take, and he told her not to be a fool.

   • Stability was restored, but once the re-entry propulsion was activated, the crew was told to prepare to come home before the end of their only day in orbit.

6. (intransitive) To discern, notice, identify or distinguish.

   • Captain Edward Carlisle, soldier as he was, martinet as he was, felt a curious sensation of helplessness seize upon him as he met her steady gaze, her alluring smile; he could not tell what this prisoner might do.

7. (transitive) To reveal.

8. (intransitive) To be revealed.
   • 1990, Stephen Coonts, Under Siege, 1991 Pocket Books edition, ?ISBN, p.409:

     Cherry looks old, Mergenthaler told himself. His age is telling. Querulous — that's the word. He's become a whining, querulous old man absorbed with trivialities.

9. (intransitive) To have an effect, especially a noticeable one; to be apparent, to be demonstrated.
   • 1859 John Stuart Mill, On Liberty

     Opinion ought [… to give] merited honour to every one, whatever opinion he may hold […] keeping nothing back which tells, or can be supposed to tell, in their favour.
10. (transitive) To use (beads or similar objects) as an aid to prayer.
11. (intransitive, childish) To inform someone in authority about a wrongdoing.

    I saw you steal those sweets! I'm going to tell!

12. (authorship, intransitive) To reveal information in prose through outright expository statement -- contrasted with show

    Maria rewrote the section of her novel that talked about Meg and Sage's friendship to have less telling and more showing.

Usage notes

• In dialects, other past tense forms (besides told) may be found, including tald/tauld (Scotland), tawld (Devonshire), teld (Yorkshire, Devonshire), telled (Northern England, Scotland, and in nonstandard speech generally), telt (Scotland, Geordie), tole (AAVE, Southern US, and some dialects of England), toll (AAVE), tolt (AAVE).
• In older forms of English, when the pronoun thou was in active use, and verbs used -est for distinct second-person singular indicative forms, the verb tell had the form tellest, and had toldest for its past tense.
• Similarly, when the ending -eth was in active use for third-person singular present indicative forms, the form telleth was used.

Conjugation

Synonyms

• (enumerate): count, number; see also Thesaurus:count
• (narrate): narrate, recount, relate
• (to instruct or inform): advise, apprise; See also Thesaurus:inform
• (reveal): disclose, make known; See also Thesaurus:divulge
• (inform someone in authority): grass up, snitch, tattle; See also Thesaurus:rat out

Antonyms

• (to instruct or inform): ask

Derived terms

Translations

Noun

tell (plural tells)

1. A reflexive, often habitual behavior, especially one occurring in a context that often features attempts at deception by persons under psychological stress (such as a poker game or police interrogation), that reveals information that the person exhibiting the behavior is attempting to withhold.
2. (archaic) That which is told; a tale or account.
   • April 4, 1743, Horace Walpole, letter to Sir Horace Mann

     I am at the end of my tell.

3. (Internet) A private message to an individual in a chat room; a whisper.

See also

• dead giveaway

Etymology 2

From Arabic ????? (tall, “hill, elevation”) or Hebrew ????? (tél, “hill”), from Proto-Semitic *tall- (“hill”).

Noun

tell (plural tells)

1. (archaeology) A hill or mound, originally and especially in the Middle East, over or consisting of the ruins of ancient settlements.

Norwegian Bokmål

Verb

tell

1. imperative of telle

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English stellen, from Old English stellan (“to give a place to, set, place”), from Proto-West Germanic *stalljan (“to put, position”), from Proto-Indo-European *stel- (“to place, put, post, stand”). Cognate with Dutch stellen (“to set, put”), Low German stellen (“to put, place, fix”), German stellen (“to set, place, provide”), Old English steall (“position, place”). More at stall.

Verb

stell (third-person singular simple present stells, present participle stelling, simple past and past participle stelled or stold)

1. (transitive, Britain dialectal, Scotland) To place in position; set up, fix, plant; prop, mount.(Can we add an example for this sense?)
2. (transitive, obsolete) To portray; delineate; display.
   • 1594, William Shakespeare, The Rape of Lucrece, 1443–44:

     To this well-painted piece is Lucrece come,

     To find a face where all distress is stelled.

   • 1609, William Shakespeare, Sonnet 24:

     Mine eye hath play'd the painter and hath stell'd

     Thy beauty's form in table of my heart ...

Etymology 2

Alteration of stall, after the verb to stell.

Noun

stell (plural stells)

1. (archaic) A place; station.
2. A stall; a fold for cattle.
3. (Scotland) A prop; a support, as for the feet in standing or climbing.
4. (Scotland) A still.
   • 1786, Robert Burns, "The Author's Earnest Cry And Prayer":

     Paint Scotland greetin owre her thrissle;

     Her mutchkin stowp as toom's a whissle;

     An' damn'd excisemen in a bussle,

     Seizin a stell,

     Triumphant crushin't like a mussel,

     Or limpet shell!

   • 1791, Robert Burns, "Such a Parcel of Rogues in a Nation":

     The English stell we could disdain,

     Secure in valour's station;

     But English gold has been our bane-

     Such a parcel of rogues in a nation!

Related terms

• stall

Anagrams

• Tells, tells

German

Verb

stell

1. singular imperative of stellen

Icelandic

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Danish stel.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /st?l?/
• Rhymes: -?l?

Noun

stell n (genitive singular stells, nominative plural stell)

1. service (set of matching dishes or untensils)
2. set of false teeth

Declension

Etymology 2

Back-formation from stella (“to potter about, to tinker”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /st?tl/
• Rhymes: -?tl

Noun

stell n (genitive singular stells, no plural)

1. pottering, tinkering, idle work

   Synonyms: föndur, bauk, dund, dútl

Declension

Plautdietsch

Adjective

stell

1. quiet, silent, still
2. calm, peaceful

Yola

Noun

stell

1. Alternative form of sthill