This week’s theme
Idioms & metaphors

This week’s words
lace-curtain
stile
millstone

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A.Word.A.Day

PRONUNCIATION:

(styl)

MEANING:

noun:
1. A set of steps or rungs allowing a person to go across a fence or wall while denying animals access.
2. A turnstile: a revolving gate that controls access to an area.
3. A support for overcoming an obstacle.

ETYMOLOGY:

From Old English stigel (stile). Earliest documented use: before 1150.

USAGE:

“We climbed over a fence stile and into a field that a neighboring farmer’s herd of Jersey cattle frequently visited.”
Mark Singer; Stringer’s Way; The New Yorker; Jun 5, 2006.

“The prose sometimes gets too heavy. Some publishers employ editors to help the tired writer over a stile.”
From Danzig to Nagasaki via Yalta; The Economist (London, UK); Apr 2, 1994.

See more usage examples of stile in Vocabulary.com’s dictionary.

A THOUGHT FOR TODAY: