stony
Language: English
Part of speech: adj
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈstəʊni/
ipa: /ˈstoʊni/
rhymes: -əʊni
Forms: form: stonier
form: stoniest
form: stoney
Etymology: From Middle English stony, stoni, stani, from Old English stāniġ, stǣniġ (“stony, rocky”), from Proto-Germanic *stainagaz (“stony”), equivalent to stone + -y. Cognate with Scots stany (“stony”), West Frisian stienich (“stony”), Dutch stenig (“stony, metalled”), German steinig (“stony, rocky, gravelly”), Swedish stenig (“stony, rocky, pebbly”).
Senses: synonyms: rock hard
antonyms: soft
glosses: As hard as stone.
examples: text: a stony path
text: The track was stony with a grassy camber up the middle.
ref: 2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 443:
synonyms: pebbly
rocky
shingly
glosses: Containing or made up of stones.
examples: text: When Victor Laszlo leads the demoralized French in the “Marseilles^([sic – meaning Marseillaise]),” and even Yvonne, the chippy who is sleeping with a Nazi officer, joins in, the stoniest intellectual collapses in tears.
ref: 2012 March 19, David Denby, “Everybody Comes to Rick’s: “Casablanca” on the Big Screen”, in The New Yorker:
synonyms: word: cold
word: cool
word: hardhearted
word: heartless
word: impassive
word: unemotional
word: unfeeling
word: callous
word: cold
word: cold-eyed
word: dour
word: flint-hearted
word: forbidding
word: frosty
word: grim
word: hard
word: hard-boiled
word: hardened
word: hardhearted
word: heartless
word: harsh
word: humorless
word: icy
word: iron-hearted
word: insensitive
word: rigorous
word: rockhearted
word: severe
word: stern
word: stonehearted
word: stony
word: stonyhearted
word: strict
word: tough
word: unsympathetic
word: unmoved
antonyms: passionate
warm
glosses: Lacking warmth and emotion.
raw_tags: of a person
examples: text: She gave him a stony reception with a stony silence.
text: o’er the heaps of dead, / Whose stony eyes glared in the morning light, / I trod; […]
ref: 1817 December, Percy Bysshe Shelley, “The Revolt of Islam. […]”, in [Mary] Shelley, editor, The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley. […], volume I, London: Edward Moxon […], published 1839, →OCLC, page 264:
text: The Oscar-thrilled audience reacted to Mailer's attempt at humor in stony silence.
ref: 1977 April 9, “Mailer Mauls "Perverts"”, in Gay Community News, page 2:
text: Perplexed, Wheeler continues to play for a moment or two, keeping to his own internal time. But after another moment it becomes clear that something is wrong, something which everybody can see but him. He steals a glance up from his instrument, and finds that Luján is staring at him. In fact, every musician in the orchestra is staring at him, all of them wearing the same expression of stony, barely-contained ang—
They've been replaced.
ref: 2019 April 10, qntm, “CASE HATE RED”, in There Is No Antimemetics Division, →ISBN, page 137:
synonyms: cold
cool
frosty
unwelcoming
antonyms: welcoming
warm
glosses: Showing no warmth of emotion.
raw_tags: of an action or expression such as a look
examples: text: Seriously, Dedalus. I’m stony. Hurry out to your school kip and bring us back some money.
ref: 1922 February, James Joyce, “[Episode 1]”, in Ulysses, Paris: Shakespeare and Company, […], →OCLC:
synonyms: word: almsless
word: arm
word: badly off
word: bankrupt
word: beggared
word: beggarly
word: boracic
word: broke
word: broken
word: broker than the Ten Commandments
word: destitute
word: dirt poor
word: disadvantaged
word: down and out
word: down at heel
word: down on one's luck
word: down on one's uppers
word: empty-handed
word: feeling the pinch
word: flat
word: hard up
word: impecunious
word: impoverished
word: in need
word: indigent
word: insolvent
word: lower-class
word: necessitous
word: needy
word: oofless
word: pauperized
word: penniless
word: penurious
word: pinched
word: pok kai
word: poor
word: poor as a church mouse
word: poor as a rat
word: poor as Job
word: possessionless
word: poverty-ridden
word: poverty-stricken
word: shillingless
word: skint
word: stone-broke
word: stony-broke
word: strapped
word: stuck
word: threadbare
word: unwealthy
word: wealthless
glosses: Ellipsis of stony broke: without any money.
Derived terms: fall on stony ground
stonily
stoniness
stony-broke
stony coral
stony-faced
stonyhearted
stony iron
stony-iron
Stony Stratford