stifle

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈstaɪfl̩/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈstaɪf(ə)l/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -aɪfəl
• Hyphenation: stif‧le

The verb is derived from Late Middle English stuflen (“to have difficulty breathing due to heat, stifle; to suffocate by drowning, drown”) ;^[1] further etymology uncertain, perhaps from stuffen (“to kill by suffocation; to stifle from heat; to extinguish, suppress (body heat, breath, humour, etc.); to deprive a plant of the conditions necessary for growth, choke”) + -el- (derivational infix in verbs, often denoting diminutive, intensive, or repetitive actions or events).^[2] Stuffen is derived from Old French estofer, estouffer (“to choke, strangle, suffocate; (figuratively) to inhibit, prevent”)  (modern French étouffer),^[3][4] a variant of estoper, estuper (“to block, plug, stop up; to stiffen, thicken”) (modern French étouper (“to caulk”)), influenced by estofer (“to pad, stuff; to upholster”) (modern French étoffer). Estoper is derived from Vulgar Latin *stuppāre, from Latin stuppa (“coarse flax, tow”) (as a stuffing material; from Ancient Greek στύπη (stúpē), στύππη (stúppē) (compare στυππεῖον (stuppeîon)); probably from Pre-Greek) + -āre. According to the Oxford English Dictionary a derivation from Old Norse stífla (“to dam; to choke, stop up”) “appears untenable on the ground both of form and sense”.^[4]

The noun is derived from the verb.^[5]

stifle (third-person singular simple present stifles, present participle stifling, simple past and past participle stifled)

1. (transitive, also figuratively) To make (an animal or person) unconscious or cause (an animal or person) death by preventing breathing; to smother, to suffocate.
   • 1708, Jonathan Swift, Accomplishment of the First Prediction:

     I took my leave, being half stifled with the closeness of the room.

   • 1717, John Dryden, “Book XII. [The Story of Cyllarus and Hylonome.]”, in Ovid’s Metamorphoses in Fifteen Books. , London: Jacob Tonson, , →OCLC, page 425:

     And while her Hand the ſtreaming Blood oppos'd; / Join'd Face to Face, his Lips with hers ſhe clos'd. / Stifled with Kiſſes, a ſweet Death he dies; / She fills the Fields with undiſtinguiſh'd Cries: [...]

2. (transitive, hyperbolic) To cause (someone) difficulty in breathing, or a choking or gagging feeling.

   The heat was stifling the children.

3. (transitive, also figuratively) To prevent (a breath, cough, or cry, or the voice, etc.) from being released from the throat.
4. (transitive) To make (something) unable to be heard by blocking it with some medium.
5. (transitive, figuratively)
   1. (transitive) To keep in, hold back, or repress (something).

      Synonyms: hinder, restrain, smother, suppress, throttle

      The army stifled the rebellion.

      • 1723, Daniel Waterland, A Second Vindication of Christ's Divinity:

        I desire only to have things fairly represented as they really are; no evidence smothered or stifled.

      • 1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC:

        Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.

      • 2011 October 29, Neil Johnston, “Norwich 3-3 Blackburn”, in BBC Sport:

        In fact, there was no suggestion of that, although Wolves deployed men behind the ball to stifle the league leaders in a first-half that proved very frustrating for City.

   2. (transitive) To prevent (something) from being revealed; to conceal, to hide, to suppress.
6. (transitive, agriculture (sericulture)) To treat (a silkworm cocoon) with steam as part of the process of silk production.
7. (intransitive) To die of suffocation.

   Two firemen tragically stifled in yesterday’s fire when trying to rescue an old lady from her bedroom.

8. (intransitive, hyperbolic) To smother; to make breathing difficult.

   This heat is stifling.

   • 2012, Ken Catran, Letters from the Coffin-Trenches, Penguin Random House New Zealand Limited, →ISBN:

     Nobody has shaved or changed clothes for a week, the heat stifles and the flies are everywhere. There is little water but we do not expect to be here long. This is not much of a letter, Jess. The mailbag goes down our trench once a day. I must finish because it stops for no one.

• stifil (obsolete, 16th c.)

• Thesaurus:die

stifle (plural stifles)

1. (rare) An act or state of being stifled.

The stifle (sense 1) is indicated as number 27 in this drawing of a horse.^{[n 1]}

A dog’s stifle (sense 1) is indicated as number 12 in the above illustration.

The noun is derived from Middle English stifle (“joint between the femur and tibia of a quadruped”) ; further etymology uncertain, probably derived from Anglo-Norman estive (“leg”), and Old French estive (“leg”) (compare Old French estival (“boot, shoe”)).^[6]

The verb is derived from the noun.^[7]

stifle (plural stifles)

1. (zootomy) The joint between the femur and tibia in the hind leg of various four-legged mammals, especially horses, corresponding to the knee in humans.

   Synonym: stifle joint

2. (veterinary medicine) A bone disease of this region.

• stifle bone
• stifle joint

stifle (third-person singular simple present stifles, present participle stifling, simple past and past participle stifled)

1. (transitive) To cause (a dog, horse, or other four-legged mammal) to dislocate or sprain its stifle joint.

• stifling (noun)

• asphyxia on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• stifle joint on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “stifle”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• flites, elfist, filets, fistle, itself, fliest, it self