stern
adjectivenounverbnouncommon in dialogue
- United Kingdom//stɜːn//
- United States//stɝn//
Having a hardness and severity of nature or manner.
adjective
- 1
Having a hardness and severity of nature or manner.
I haue beene wooed, as I intreat thee now, / Euen by the ſterne, and direfull God of warre, / VVhoſe ſinowie necke in battel nere did bow, / VVho conquers where he comes in euery iarre; […]
stern as tutors, and as uncles hard
Risk is everywhere. From tabloid headlines insisting that coffee causes cancer (yesterday, of course, it cured it) to stern government warnings about alcohol and driving, the world is teeming with goblins.
- 2
Grim and forbidding in appearance.
The remark earned me a stern rebuke.
these barren rocks, your stern inheritance
Etymology
From Middle English stern, sterne, sturne, from Old English styrne (“stern, grave, strict, austere, hard, severe, cruel”), from Proto-Germanic *sturnijaz (“angry, astonished, shocked”), from Proto-Indo-European *ster- (“rigid, stiff”). Cognate with Scots stern (“bold, courageous, fierce, resolute”), Old High German stornēn (“to be astonished”), Dutch stuurs (“glum, austere”), Swedish stursk (“insolent”).
noun
- 1
The rear part (after end) of a ship or other vessel.
Holonyms: watercraft < vessel
Old Applegate, in the stern, just set and looked at me, and Lord James, amidship, waved both arms and kept hollering for help. I took a couple of everlasting big strokes and managed to grab hold of the skiff's rail, close to the stern.
- 2
figurativeThe post of management or direction.
and sit chiefest stern of public weal
- 3
The hinder part of anything.
- 4
The tail of an animal; now used only of the tail of a dog.
And all attonce her beaſtly bodie raizd / With doubled forces high aboue the ground: / Tho wrapping vp her wrethed ſterne arownd, / Lept fierce vpon his ſhield, [...]
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English sterne, likely from Old Norse stjórn (“control, steering”), related to stýra (“to steer”), from Proto-Germanic *stiurijaną, whence also English steer. Also possibly from Old Frisian stiarne (“rudder”), from the same Germanic root. The sense referring to a management post alludes to the fact that a sailing ship's captain would often stand on an aft deck.
verb
- 1
obsoleteTo steer, to direct the course of (a ship).
- 2
To propel or move backward or stern-first in the water.
noun
- 1
A bird, the black tern, seabird.
Etymology
From a variant of tern.
Forms
- plural
- sterns
- comparative
- sterner
- superlative
- sternest
- past tense
- sterned
- past participle
- sterned
- present participle
- sterning
- third person singular
- sterns
stern · Having a hardness and severity of nature or manner.
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