▪ I. stilling, n.1
(ˈstɪlɪŋ)
Also 7 steeling(e, stillinge, stylling, 8 stillen. See also stillion.
[Perh. corruptly a. Du. stelling stand, scaffold, f. stellen to place. Cf. stillage.]
A stand for a cask, a gantry.
| 1604 Ball. Coll. Oxf. Acc. (MS.), Item, to Golidge [a carpenter] for makinge stillings for beare, and other worke, vis i{supd}. 1665 in Halliwell Acc. Collect. Bills etc. (1852) 17 In the strong Beere Seller. A stylling. 1743 Lond. & Country Brewer iii. (ed. 2) 235 They roll and tumble the Barrel backwards and forwards up and down on a Stilling. 1827 Sir J. Barrington Pers. Sk. II. 49 Very like a beer barrel on its stilling. 1875 Knight Dict. Mech., Stilling, a stand for casks. A stillion. |
▪ II. stilling, n.2 Mining.
(ˈstɪlɪŋ)
[Of obscure origin.]
(See quots.)
| 1883 Gresley Gloss. Coal-mining 240 Stilling, the walling of a shaft within the tubbing above the stone head. 1899 Baring-Gould Bk. West II. Cornw. v. 63 [Tin mining] The walling on each side of a tye or adit is called stilling. |
▪ III. stilling, vbl. n.1
(ˈstɪlɪŋ)
[f. still v.1 + -ing1.]
The action of making still; quietening; calming.
| 1530 Palsgr. 276/1 Styllyng or apeysing, apeisement. 1622 Hakewill David's Vow vii. 258 A deceit..which Nurses vse for the stilling of their Children. c 1698 Locke Cond. Understand. §xlv, Thus some trivial sentence, or a scrap of poetry, will sometimes get into men's heads, and make such a chiming there, that there is no stilling of it. 1792 F. Burney Lett. 20 Dec., The pretended friends of the people..wait but the stilling of the present ferment of royalty to come forth. 1846 Trench Mirac. xix. 310 They..might pluck the ripe ears for the stilling of their present hunger. 1863 M. L. Whately Ragged Life in Egypt 200 It is beautiful when the sun draws in his fiery shafts to watch the stilling of the air. |
▪ IV. stilling, vbl. n.2
(ˈstɪlɪŋ)
Also 6 steeling, steylling, stylling, -yng.
[f. still v.2 + -ing1.]
† 1. The action of the verb still2; distillation.
| 1477 Norton Ordin. Alch. v. in Ashm. (1652) 79 Liquor is in manie manners found..Some with stilling, as Waters be made. 1573–80 Tusser Husb. (1878) 115 The knowledge of stilling is one pretie feat. 1683 Tryon Way to Health 554, I appeal to your selves, if your Wort would not have turned sower,..and of no use or virtue, except for Stilling. |
| attrib. 1545 in R. H. Lathbury Denham, Bucks (1904) 339 All the shelfes and formes that are in the stillinge house. 1573 in Rep. Middleton MSS. (Hist. MSS. Comm. 1911) 438 To the cater..for the exchaunge of a steeling pott, iiij s. 1596 in Archæologia LXIV. 375 For 1 dor in ye steylling house. 1600 Surflet Country Farm iii. lxiv. 578 The stilling vessels. 1840 Liebig's Org. Chem. Relat. Agric. 294 The wine in the stilling-casks. |
b. Ireland. Illicit distillation of spirits.
| 1896 Blackw. Mag. Oct. 470/1 The Roman Catholic Bishop of Raphoe..has done more to stamp out ‘stilling’ than the R.I.C. could accomplish in a generation. 1912 Ibid. Dec. 787/2 Many parts of the Blue Ridge have long been notorious for the stilling which was carried on there, mostly on the illicit plan. |
† 2. Dropping or trickling. Obs.
| 1530 Palsgr. 276/1 Styllyng or droppyng of lycour, distillation. 1538 Elyot Dict., Catarrhus, a rewme or styllynge downe of water or fleme from the heed. 1576 Baker Gesner's Jewell of Health 4 The yelowe seedes within the Rose..boyled in Wyne and drunke, doth staye..the styllings downe to the Gummes. |
▪ V. stilling, ppl. a.1
(ˈstɪlɪŋ)
[f. still v.1 + -ing2.]
That makes still; quietening; calming.
| 1635 Sibbes Serm. John xiv. 1 (1636) 35 Thus faith becomes a quieting and a stilling grace. 1844 Kinglake Eothen ii. (1847) 18 More stilling than very silence. 1873 R. Broughton Nancy III. 126 There is something so stilling in the far placidity of the high stars. 1902 Academy 22 Mar. 324/1 The touch like a stilling finger, The whisper, the sigh. |
▪ VI. † ˈstilling, ppl. a.2 Obs.
[f. still v.2 + -ing2.]
Trickling or falling in drops; distilling.
| a 1542 Wyatt Poems, ‘Process of time’ 6 And yet an hert that sems so tender receveth no dropp of the stilling teres that [etc.]. 1565 Golding Ovid's Met. i. (1593) 9 And on his feathers and his breast a stilling dew did sticke. |