Dictionary

stirless en · ADJ

Pronunciation

• /ˈstəːləs/ (UK)

Etymology

From stir + -less.

Meanings

1. (archaic, poetic) Motionless, still.
   • Often, after an active morning, she would spend a sunny afternoon in lying stirless on the turf, at the foot of some tree of friendly umbrage: no society did she need but that of Caroline, and it sufficed if she were within call; no spectacle did she ask but that of the deep blue sky, and such cloudlets as sailed afar and aloft across its span; no sound but that of the bee's hum, the leaf's whisper." 1912, May Sinclair, The Three Bront:
   • Like one dead she sat and waited, Listening to the stirless silence, Ages in a second, till, Lightly leaping, came her lover, And, still smiling, laid the sweet Snow-white blossom at her feet. 1876, Helen Hunt Jackson, Mercy Philbrick's Choice:
   • For there it lies so tranquil, so beloved, / All that it hath of Life with us is living; / So gentle, stirless, helpless, and unmoved, / And all unconscious of the joy 't is giving [...]. 1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, II.197:

Forms

Deriveds

stirlessness · stirlessly