stall

stall¹ compartment; to stop

Etymology

The compartment is inherited from Middle English stal, inherited from Old English steall (“standing place, position; stable”),^[3][6][4][7] inherited from Proto-Germanic *stallaz.^[8][9][10] It is cognate with Old Frisian stal, Dutch stal, Old High German stal, German Stall (“stable”) and Old Norse stallr (“pedestal, stall for a horse”), and related to stellen (“to place”).^[4][11][6] Hoad and Kroonen derive the Germanic noun from the base of stand,^[8][10][2] while Etymonline suggests Proto-Indo-European *stel- (“to put, stand”).^[3] Some senses, such as the stand for selling goods and the seat of office, were influenced by Old French estal (“position, stall”), itself borrowed from Germanic.^[3][8][7] The verb comes from several sources that merged: the noun, estaler, and shortenings of install and forestall.^[6][3]

Earliest recorded meaning

In Old English a standing place, position or state, and a place where cattle are kept, a stable.^[6][3][4]

Semantic evolution

The general sense "place, position" died out in the early 17th century,^[6][7] but the stall of a stable kept its meaning, and the word spread to other enclosed places: a seat of office (1399), the canopied seats of a church choir (c. 1400), a stand or booth for selling goods (late 14th century, implied in stallage as early as the mid-13th),^[6][3][8] the seats nearest the stage in a theatre (1828), a parking space in North America (1940) and the cubicles of a washroom (1967).^[6][3] The verb first meant "to dwell" (c. 1315), then "to put an animal in a stall" (1390) and "to install in office" (Chaucer, c. 1384);^[6][3] hence the stalled ox of the Authorized Version, fattened in its stall.^[12][1] "To come to a stand", and "to stick fast" in mud or snow, date from the 15th century.^[3][7] Engines stalled from 1904 and aircraft by 1910,^[3] and the noun for this loss of power or lift followed (1916 in Merriam-Webster; 1918 for aircraft and 1959 for car engines in Etymonline).^[1][3]

Timeline

• Old English – a place; a stable.^[6]
• c. 1315 – the verb, to dwell.^[6]
• c. 1384 – to install in office.^[6]
• 1390 – to put an animal in a stall.^[6]
• late 14th century – a booth for selling goods.^[3]
• c. 1400 – a seat in a church choir;^[3] also, of the verb, to come to a stand.^[3]
• 1828 – the stalls of a theatre.^[6]
• 1904 – of an engine, to stop.^[3]
• 1910 – of an aircraft, to lose lift.^[3]
• 1916 – the noun, loss of lift in an aircraft.^[1]
• 1940 – a parking space (US).^[6]
• 1967 – a compartment in a washroom.^[6]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A compartment in a stable or shed for a single animal.
2. A small stand, booth or table from which goods are sold, as at a market.
3. One of a row of enclosed seats in the choir of a church, for the clergy or choir.
4. (British, in plural) The seats on the ground floor of a theatre, nearest the stage.
5. A small enclosed compartment, as for a shower or toilet.
6. (North America) A marked parking space.
7. A sudden stopping of an engine; in an aircraft, a loss of lift caused by too steep an angle or too low a speed.
8. A finger-stall, a sheath for an injured finger.

Verb

1. Of an engine or vehicle: to stop suddenly; to cause (an engine) to do this.
2. To come to a standstill; to stick fast: the talks stalled over pay.
3. To put or keep (an animal) in a stall, especially for fattening.

Word family

• stallage
• stallholder
• finger-stall

stall² decoy; to delay

Etymology

The decoy is borrowed from Anglo-Norman estal, a variant of estale (“decoy, pigeon used to lure a hawk”),^[6][7][3] the source also of the older English stale "decoy" (before 1425).^[4][3][13] Its form was influenced by the stall of a stable.^[1][13][14] The Anglo-Norman word is probably of Germanic origin:^[4][13] Etymonline derives it from Old French estal (“place, stand”), from Frankish *stal- (“position”),^[3] and Barnhart and Dictionary.com compare Old English stælhrān (“decoy reindeer”), explaining that the decoy was kept in a fixed place.^[4][15]

Earliest recorded meaning

A decoy bird, chiefly in figurative use: ?a1500, in the Chester Plays.^[6][7] Barnhart dates the form stall to probably before 1500.^[4]

Semantic evolution

In the thieves' slang of Robert Greene's pamphlets on cony-catching (1591–92) a stall was a pickpocket's accomplice who distracted or hemmed in the victim, and to stall was to screen the theft.^[6][3][16] From the diversion came the evasive excuse: Vaux's Flash Dictionary has stall off for getting rid of someone by a trick or a plausible story (1812 in Etymonline's dating, 1819 in the OED's),^[3][6] and around 1900 a stall-off was a pretence in Lancashire and Nottinghamshire dialect as well as in London.^[17] By 1829 stall meant to put someone off,^[6] and in American English by 1903 to play for time or be evasive.^[6][3] The noun for such a delaying tactic is recorded from 1945.^[6]

Timeline

• ?a1500 – a decoy bird (obsolete by 1592).^[6]
• 1591 – a pickpocket's accomplice.^[6]
• 1592 – the verb, to screen a pickpocket.^[6]
• 1812 – stall off, an evasive trick, in Etymonline's dating; 1819 in the OED.^[3][6]
• 1829 – to put someone off.^[6]
• 1851 – a pretext.^[6][3]
• 1903 – to play for time.^[6][3]
• 1945 – the noun, an act of stalling.^[6]

Modern meaning

Noun

1. A trick or excuse used to delay or to hide one's real intentions.
2. (slang) A pickpocket's accomplice who distracts the victim.

Verb

1. To delay or avoid action by evasion; to play for time: he stalled until his lawyer arrived.
2. To put off or hold back (someone) by evasion.