still
Language: English
Part of speech: adv
Pronunciation: ipa: /stɪl/
ipa: [stɪɫ]
note: l-vocalizing: UK, General Australian, New Zealand
ipa: [stɪo̯]
note: l-vocalizing: UK, General Australian, New Zealand
ipa: [stɪʊ̯]
rhymes: -ɪl
Forms: form: stil
form: stille
form: styll
form: stylle
Etymology: From Middle English stille (“motionless, stationary”), from Old English stille (“still, quiet”), from Proto-West Germanic *stillī, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)telH- (“to be silent; to be still”). Cognate with Scots stil (“still”), Saterland Frisian stil (“motionless, calm, quiet”), West Frisian stil (“quiet, still”), Dutch stil (“quiet, silent, still”), Low German still (“quiet, silent, still”), German still (“still, quiet, tranquil, silent”), Swedish stilla (“quiet, silent, peaceful”), Icelandic stilltur (“set, quiet, calm, still”). Related to stall.
(noun: Falkland Islander): Military slang, short for still a Benny, since the military had been instructed not to refer to the islanders by the derogatory term Benny (which see).
Senses: examples: text: They stood still until the guard was out of sight.
glosses: Without motion.
examples: text: Is it still raining? It was still raining five minutes ago.
text: We’ve seen most of the sights, but we are still visiting the museum.
text: I’m still not wise enough to answer that.
text: It hath been anciently reported, and is still received.
ref: 1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC:
text: Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.
ref: 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:
text: Hepaticology, outside the temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere, still lies deep in the shadow cast by that ultimate "closet taxonomist," Franz Stephani—a ghost whose shadow falls over us all.
ref: 1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill.: Field Museum of Natural History, →ISBN, page vii:
text: An artificial kidney these days still means a refrigerator-sized dialysis machine. Such devices mimic the way real kidneys cleanse blood and eject impurities and surplus water as urine.
ref: 2013 June 1, “A better waterworks”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8838, page 5 (Technology Quarterly):
qualifier: aspect
glosses: Up to a time, as in the preceding time.
examples: text: Tom is tall; Dick is taller; Harry is still taller / Harry is taller still.
text: The guilt being great, the fear doth still exceed.
ref: 1594, William Shakespeare, Lucrece (First Quarto), London: […] Richard Field, for Iohn Harrison, […], →OCLC:
qualifier: degree
glosses: To an even greater degree. Used to modify comparative adjectives or adverbs.
examples: text: I’m not hungry, but I’ll still manage to find room for dessert.
text: Yeah, but still...
text: She'd been here many times before, it was true. Still, she held out some hope.
text: As sunshine, broken in the rill, / Though turned astray, is sunshine still.
ref: 1817, Thomas Moore, Lalla Rookh […] , London: Longman […] :
text: Given the thorny intelligence of [J. C.] Chandor’s previous films (which also include Margin Call and A Most Violent Year), it's hard to believe that he thought it was a good idea to play Fleetwood Mac's "The Chain" over a sequence of Pope telling the others that he can't do this job without them, or to accompany shots of the men running through the jungle with Creedence Clearwater Revival's "Run Through The Jungle." (Okay, they're stealthily walking. But still.)
ref: 2019 July 3, Mike D’Angelo, “Oscar Isaac and Ben Affleck Blunder through a Heavy Heist in J. C. Chandor’s Triple Frontier”, in The A.V. Club, archived from the original on 21 Nov 2019:
glosses: Nevertheless.
examples: text: Lechery, lechery, still wars and lechery; nothing else holds fashion.
ref: c. 1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Troylus and Cressida”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act V, scene ii], lines 201–202:
text: [W]hereas many Chymiſts vvould be vaſtly rich, if they could ſtill do in great Quantities vvhat they have ſometimes done in little ones, many have undone themſelves by obſtinately attempting to make even real Experiments more gainful.
ref: 1661, Robert Boyle, “[Two Essays, Concerning the Unsuccessfulness of Experiments, Containing Divers Admonitions and Observations (Chiefly Chymical) Touching that Subject.] The Second Essay, of Un-succeeding Experiments.”, in Certain Physiological Essays and Other Tracts; […], 2nd edition, London: […] Henry Herringman […], published 1669, →OCLC, page 78:
text: The desire of fame betrays an ambitious man into indecencies that lessen his reputation; he is still afraid lest any of his actions should be thrown away in private.
ref: 1712 January 2 (Gregorian calendar), [Joseph Addison; Richard Steele et al.], “SATURDAY, December 22, 1711”, in The Spectator, number 255; republished in Alexander Chalmers, editor, The Spectator; a New Edition, […], volume III, New York, N.Y.: D[aniel] Appleton & Company, 1853, →OCLC:
text: I vex my heart with fancies dim:
⁠He still outstript me in the race;
⁠It was but unity of place
That made me dream I rank’d with him.
ref: 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], “Canto XLI”, in In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC, page 64:
glosses: Always; invariably; constantly; continuously.
examples: text: Some dogs howl; more yelp; still more bark.
text: Some poems, echoing the purpose of early poetic treatises on scientific principles, attempt to elucidate the mathematical concepts that underlie prime numbers. Others play with primes’ cultural associations. Still others derive their structure from mathematical patterns involving primes.
ref: 2013 July-August, Sarah Glaz, “Ode to Prime Numbers”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4:
qualifier: extensive
glosses: Even, yet.
examples: text: 'Yeah yeah, I'm good still, Stace,' I said.
ref: 2022, Moses McKenzie, An Olive Grove in Ends:
text: HALIL: I can't lie, I didn't expect it from you, man, still!
ref: 2022 June 2, Gabrielle Wood, 16:17 from the start, in Teddy Nygh, director, PRU (1), episode 2 (TV), spoken by Halil (Jay Ersavas):
glosses: Alternative spelling of styll.
Synonyms: sense: without motion
word: akinetically
sense: without motion
word: motionlessly
sense: without motion
word: stock still
sense: without motion
word: stockishly
sense: up to a time
word: yet
sense: to an even greater degree
word: yet
sense: to an even greater degree
word: even
sense: nevertheless
word: nonetheless
word: though
word: yet
word: nevertheless
sense: always
word: consistently
word: invariably
word: uniformly
Derived terms: even still
still and all
still and anon
still got one's communion money
still-green
still with us
the jury is still out