different between atilt vs stilt

English

Alternative forms

• a-tilt

Etymology

a- +? tilt

Adjective

atilt (not comparable)

1. At an angle from the vertical or horizontal.
   • 1902, William Dean Howells, “Worries of a Winter Walk” in Literature and Life, New York: Harper, p. 37,^[1]

     When I came to the river, I ached in sympathy with the shipping painfully atilt on the rock-like surface of the brine, which broke against the piers, and sprayed itself over them like showers of powdered quartz.

   • 1918, Winston Churchill, A Traveller in War-Time, New York: Macmillan, Chapter 3, p. 77,^[2]

     In other villages the shawled women sat knitting behind piles of beets and cabbages and apples, their farm-carts atilt in the sun.

   • 1954, Allen Ginsberg, Journal entry in Gordon Ball (ed.), Journals, New York: Grove, 1977, p. 70,

     Pink bedroom lamp, shade atilt over Uncle Abe’s ancient clean radio,

   Synonym: tilted

Adverb

atilt (not comparable)

1. At an angle from the vertical or horizontal; at the point of falling over.
   • 1659, Nicholas Culpeper, Culpeper’s School of Physick, London: N. Brook, “Doctor Diets Directory,” p. 300,^[3]

     Ale should not be drunk under five dayes old; new Ale is unwholsome, sowre Ale, and dead, and Ale which do stand atilt is most unwholesome.

   • 1733, Alexander Pope, The Impertinent, London: John Wileord, p. 12,^[4]

     In that nice Moment, as another Lye

     Stood just a-tilt, the Minister came by.

   • 1928, Maurice Walsh, While Rivers Run, London: W. & R. Chambers, Chapter 24,^[5]

     […] the slope flattened to a wide shelf where limestone cropped through the heather and many huge boulders were scattered atilt.

   • 1969, Ray Bradbury, “The Haunting of the New” in I Sing the Body Electric!, New York: Knopf p. 136,^[6]

     Had earthquakes shaken the windows atilt so they mirrored intruders with distorted gleams and glares?

2. Tilting or as if tilting (charging with a lance, like a knight on horseback in a joust).
   • c. 1591, William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part 1, Act III, Scene 2,^[7]

     What will you do, good grey-beard? break a lance,

     And run a tilt at death within a chair?

   • 1669, Samuel Lee, Contemplations on Mortality, London, Chapter 7, p. 69,^[8]

     The shadow of death to David is but the shadow of evill. Though ten thousand Curiassiers run upon him atilt with envenom’d and poysoned spears, he layes him down in the bosome of God, he sleeps in peace;

   • 1684, Samuel Butler, Hudibras, London, Canto 2, p. 79,^[9]

     Make feeble Ladies, in their Works,

     To fight like Termagants and Turks;

     To lay their native Arms aside,

     Their modesty, and ride a-stride;

     To run a-Tilt at Men, and wield

     Their naked tools in open field;

   • 1895, F. F. Montrésor, Into the Highways and Hedges, New York: Appleton, Part 2, Chapter 9, p. 235,^[10]

     Other people may ride atilt against all the problems one bruises head and heart over. Good luck go with them, and more power to their elbows!

Preposition

atilt

1. Diagonally over or across.

   Synonym: aslant

   • 1911, Jennie Brooks, Under Oxford Trees, Cincinnati: Jennings and Graham, p. 80,^[11]

     A butterfly flew into the garden, danced a stately minuet mid-air, courtsied, and settled atilt the top rail of the old “snake fence.”

   • 1982, Jean Scott Wood Creighton (as J. S. Borthwick), The Case of the Hook-billed Kites, New York: St. Martin’s Press, Chapter 11, p. 29,^[12]

     [He] was balanced atilt a wooden chair, his legs resting on a low file cabinet.

   • 2004, Tracy Dahlby, Allah’s Torch, New York: William Morrow, Chapter 11, p. 146,^[13]

     With his shy grin, bushy black hair, and thick plastic-framed glasses riding atilt his nose, Reza looked like a high school techno-whiz temporarily locked out of the computer lab.

Anagrams

• T-tail

English

Etymology

From Middle English stilte, stulte, from Old English *stilte, *stylte, from Proto-Germanic *stiltij?, *staltij?, *stultij? (“stilt”), from Proto-Germanic *stelt- (“to be stiff”). Akin to Danish stylte, Dutch stelt, German Stelze.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /st?lt/
• Rhymes: -?lt

Noun

stilt (plural stilts)

1. Either of two poles with footrests that allow someone to stand or walk above the ground; used mostly by entertainers.
2. A tall pillar or post used to support some structure; often above water.
3. Any of various wading birds of the genera Himantopus and Cladorhynchus, related to the avocet, that have extremely long legs and long thin bills.
4. A crutch.
5. The handle of a plough.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Halliwell to this entry?)

Derived terms

• black-necked stilt (Himantopus mexicanus)
• stilt plover (Himantopus knudseni)
• stilt sandpiper (Calidris himantopus)

Translations

Verb

stilt (third-person singular simple present stilts, present participle stilting, simple past and past participle stilted)

1. to raise on stilts, or as if on stilts

Further reading

• stilt on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Anagrams

• Litts, tilts

Norwegian Bokmål

Alternative forms

• stillet (Etymology 3)

Verb

stilt

1. past participle of stille

Norwegian Nynorsk

Etymology 1

Verb

stilt

1. past participle of stilla

Etymology 2

Adjective

stilt

1. neuter singular of still