STALE • FREE TRANSLATOR.ORG • Definition of Stale

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adjective

Stale adj.

Vapid or tasteless from age; having lost its life, spirit, and flavor, from being long kept; as, stale beer.

Not new; not freshly made; as, stale bread.

Having lost the life or graces of youth; worn out; decayed. "A stale virgin."

Worn out by use or familiarity; having lost its novelty and power of pleasing; trite; common. "Wit itself, if stale is less pleasing." "How weary, stale flat, and unprofitable Seem to me all the uses of this world!"

Stale affidavit (Law), an affidavit held above a year.

Stale demand (Law), a claim or demand which has not been pressed or demanded for a long time.

noun

Stale n. (Written also steal, stele, etc) The stock or handle of anything; as, the stale of a rake. "But seeing the arrow's stale without, and that the head did go No further than it might be seen."

Stale n.

That which is stale or worn out by long keeping, or by use. (Obs.)

A prostitute. (Obs.)

Urine, esp. that of beasts. "Stale of horses."

Stale n.

Something set, or offered to view, as an allurement to draw others to any place or purpose; a decoy; a stool pigeon. (Obs.) "Still, as he went, he crafty stales did lay."

A stalking-horse. (Obs.)

(Chess) A stalemate. (Obs.)

A laughingstock; a dupe. (Obs.)

verb

Stale v. t. (past & past part. staled; pres. part. staling) To make vapid or tasteless; to destroy the life, beauty, or use of; to wear out. "Age can not wither her, nor custom stale Her infinite variety."

Stale v. i. To make water; to discharge urine; said especially of horses and cattle.

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Etymology of 'Stale'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Stale" Quotes from Famous Books

... fifteen years you have been tossing in the literary world; you are no longer young, you have padded the hoof till your soles are worn through!—Yes, my boy, you turn your socks under like a street urchin to hide the holes, so that the legs cover the heels! In short, the joke is too stale. Your excuses are more familiar ...

— Parisians in the Country - The Illustrious Gaudissart, and The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... the mud they saw the stale imprint of Ben's canoe as they had landed, and the tracks of both the man and the girl as they had turned into ...

— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall

... familiar mendicant was a vender of printed ballads. These effusions were so stale, atrocious, and unsalable in their character, that it was easy to detect that hypocrisy, which—in imitation of more ambitious beggary—veiled the real eleemosynary appeal under the thin pretext of offering ...

— Urban Sketches • Bret Harte

... rustlers at work. He told me how to find it, an'—well, I hit the trail. I hoped to head you, and get 'em myself, but," with a shrug, "I guess I was a fool some. My plug petered out two hours back, and I had to quit. You see he was stale ...

— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... the sound of rushing waters, which then fell into the abyss beneath with a loud roar. After this she came upon a large grotto, hewn in the living rock and defended by a row of staring crocodiles' heads, plated with gold; the heavy smell of stale incense and acrid resins choked her, and her way now lay over iron gratings and past strangely contrived furnaces. The walls were decorated with colored reliefs: Tantalus, Ixion, and Sisyphus toiling at his stone, looked down on her in hideous realism as she went. Rock chambers, ...

— Uarda • Georg Ebers

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