▪ I. † ˈstagnate, a. Obs.
[ad. L. stagnāt-us: see stagnate v. and -ate2.]
= stagnant a.
| 1706 De Foe Jure Div. v. 13 The stagnate Vapours of the Flood. Ibid. 30 When..the Stagnate Brain Resolves on Death, our Application's vain. 1731 T. Gordon Tacitus, Agricola II. 360 This Sea [the Orkneys] they report to be slow and stagnate. 1761 Ann. Reg., Charac. 41/1 The air becomes grosser and grosser until it becomes torpid and stagnate. 1794 M. Wollstonecraft View Fr. Rev. I. 520 Lazy friars are driven out of their cells as stagnate bodies that corrupt society. 1813 J. C. Hobhouse Journ. (ed. 2) 683 The ancient port of Troas, a small circular basin, half choked up and stagnate. 1818 Ann. Reg., Chron. 570 A large pool of stagnate water. a 1845 Hood Lamia vii. 4 Such a calm As a shipmate curses on the stagnate sea Under the torrid zone. |
▪ II. stagnate, v.
(ˈstægneɪt, stægˈneɪt)
[f. L. stagnāt- ppl. stem of stagnāre to stagnate, to be overflowed, f. stagn-um pool: see -ate3.]
1. intr. To be or become stagnant; to cease to flow, to stand without motion or current. a. of water, air, (the ice of) a glacier or ice sheet, etc.
| 1669 W. Simpson Hydrol. Chym. 326 Motion keeps water from stagnating. 1681 J. Scott Chr. Life i. iii. §1 (1684) 55 Their unexercised Reason will..like standing water, stagnate and gather mire. 1682 Wheler Journ. Greece vi. 453 We past by a Fountain, that presently seems to stagnate into the Lake of Marathon. 1691 Ray Creation i. (1704) 88 The Air that stagnated in the Shaft. 1769 E. Bancroft Guiana 20 The water..stagnates and corrupts during those months in which the rains intermit. 1789 W. Buchan Dom. Med. (1790) 77 Wherever air stagnates long, it becomes unwholesome. 1805–6 Cary Dante, Inf. ix. 111 Where Rhone stagnates on the plains of Arles. a 1845 Barham Ingol. Leg., House-warming, The valley, where stagnates Fleet Ditch. 1924 Bull. N.Y. State Mus. No. 251. 159 If any general cause were to operate to deprive the whole glacier of a part of its pressure head, this part would be more likely to respond by stagnating. 1968 R. W. Fairbridge Encycl. Geomorphol. 1045/1 A variety of landforms have been interpreted as evidence that ice stagnated and melted over large areas during its retreat from various parts of Europe and North America. |
| transf. 1783 Crabbe Village i. 271 Or wipes the tear that stagnates in his eyes. 1866 Cornh. Mag. Aug. 137 The tea stagnating on a small table. |
b. of the blood or other liquids of the body.
| a 1687 Cotton Anacreontick Poems (1689) 88, I am fifty Winters old, Bloud then stagnates and grows cold. 1706 Phillips (ed. Kersey), To Stagnate, to lie still after such a manner, to want a free Course, as the Blood does, when grown too thick. 1789 W. Buchan Dom. Med. (1790) 125 By stagnating in the bladder it [urine] becomes thicker. 1818 Scott Hrt. Midl. i, Nursing their revengeful passions just to keep their blood from stagnating. 1845 Budd Dis. Liver 281 When it..causes the bile to stagnate in it, by narrowing the cystic or the common duct. 1878 J. S. Bristowe Th. & Pract. Med. 115 The blood tends to accumulate and to stagnate in the capillaries and veins. |
2. a. fig. and in figurative context.
| 1709 Steele & Swift Tatler No. 68 ¶1 Without this Impulse to Fame and Reputation, our Industry would stagnate. 1756 Burke Subl. & B. i. xix, Nothing tends more to the corruption of science than to suffer it to stagnate. 1799 Ht. Lee Canterb. T., Frenchm. T. (ed. 2) I. 312 The stream of life now seemed to stagnate. 1818 Byron Juan Ded. xv, Its very courage stagnates to a vice. 1850 Tennyson In Mem. xxvii. 11, I envy not..The heart that never plighted troth But stagnates in the weeds of sloth. 1866 G. Stephens Runic Mon. I. 16 Dialects may stagnate for centuries, or may rapidly change, according to circumstances. 1874 H. R. Reynolds John Bapt. viii. 517 The faith of the Church would have stagnated. |
b. Of a person or people: To subside into a stagnant mode of existence.
| 1774 Nicholls Let. in Gray's Wks. (1843) V. 175, I wish at my return very much to run down to you before I sit down to stagnate on the bank of my lake. 1838 Prescott Ferd. & Is. Pref. (1846) I. 15 Better be hurried forward for a season on the wings of the tempest, than stagnate in a death-like calm. 1878 Liddon in J. O. Johnston Life viii. (1904) 222 Mahommedanism condemns the races which it curses to stagnate in evil. 1911 Marett Anthropol. iv. 120 The net result was that, despite a very fair environment..man [in Australia] on the whole stagnated. |
c. nonce-uses. To be delayed in transit; to pass sluggishly along.
| 1787 Jefferson Writ. (1859) II. 255, I have sometimes suspected that my letters stagnate in the post-offices. 1837 Carlyle Fr. Rev. I. vii. xi, [The procession] slow; stagnating along, like a shoreless Lake, yet with a noise like Niagara, Like Babel and Bedlam. |
3. a. trans. To cause to be or become stagnant.
| 1693 J. Edwards Author. O. & N. Test. I. 134 Whence gushed out an Inundation of Water, that is here stagnated, and become a filthy Lake. 1708 Brit. Apollo No. 89. 2/2 The Blood is in a Manner stagnated. 1745 P. Thomas Jrnl. Anson's Voy. 9 The Country being so very woody that the Air must needs be stagnated. 1750 G. Hughes Barbados 3 We have neither bogs nor marshes to stagnate our waters. 1801 Southey Let. to Lieut. Southey 28 Mar. in C. C. Southey Life (1850) II. 130 The one river with its rush almost stagnates the other. 1806 Med. Jrnl. XV. 476 In which blood..remaining stagnated in its proper vessels, did not coagulate. 1818 Keats Endym. ii. 954 Cruel god, Desist! or my offended mistress' nod Will stagnate all thy fountains. 1842 Loudon Suburb. Hort. 68 The power which these bodies have of stopping the transmission of heat depends on the air which is stagnated in their vacuities. |
b. transf. and fig.
| 1745 De Foe's Eng. Tradesman vii. (1840) I. 47 His credit, the life and blood of his trade, is stagnated. 1756 Washington Lett. Writ. (1889) I. 331, I am so weak-handed here, that I could not, without stagnating the public works, spare a man to these people's assistance. 1906 Daily Chron. 18 Oct. 4/7 There is a tendency for age to stagnate a man's initiative, invention and energy. |
4. To astonish, stagger. dial. and U.S.
| 1784 J. Belknap Tour to White Mts. (1876) 16 note, The most romantic imagination here finds itself surprized and stagnated. 1829 Brockett N.C. Gloss. (ed. 2), Stagnate, to astonish. ‘I'll stagnate her wi' my story’. 1864 J. C. Atkinson Stanton Grange 198 It was Bob's turn to be stagnated now. |