staunch
Meanings
- Not permitting water or some other liquid to escape or penetrate; watertight.
- Impermeable to air or other gases; airtight.
- Strongly built; also, in good or strong condition.
- Staying true to one's aims or principles; firm, resolute, unswerving.
- Dependable, loyal, reliable, trustworthy.
- Of a hunting dog: that can be depended on to pick up the scent of, or to mark, game.
- Cautious, restrained.
- Stubborn, intransigent.
- Alternative spelling of stanch.
- That which stanches or checks a flow.
- A plant or substance which stops the flow of blood; a styptic.
- An act of stanching or stopping.
- Synonym of afterdamp (“suffocating gases present in a coal mine after an explosion caused by firedamp”).
- Alternative spelling of stanch (“a floodgate by which water is accumulated, for floating a boat over a shallow part of a stream by its release; also, a dam or lock in a river”).
Pronunciation
Word forms
Etymology
From Middle English staunch, staunche (“(adjective) in good condition or repair; solidly made, firm; watertight; of a person or wound: not bleeding; certain; intact; (adverb) firmly, soundly”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman estaunche, Old French estanche (“firm; watertight”) (modern French étanche (“airtight; watertight”)), a variant of estanc (“a pond”), from estanchier (“to stop the flow of a liquid (blood, water, etc.); to make (something) watertight; to quench (thirst)”) (modern French étancher), possibly from one of the following: * From Vulgar Latin *stagnicāre, from Latin stāgnum (“piece of standing water, pond; fen, swamp”), possibly from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂g- (“to drip; to seep”). * From Vulgar Latin *stānticāre, from *stānticus (“tired”), from Latin stāns, stāntis (“standing; remaining, staying”). Stāns is the present active participle of stō (“to stand; to remain, stay”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *steh₂- (“to stand (up)”). Cognates * Italian stanco (“bored; tired”) * Portuguese estanque (“watertight”) * Romansh staunza (“a room”) * Spanish estanco (“closed, sealed; airtight; watertight”)