stilted
Pronunciation
  • (RP, GA) IPA: /ˈstɪltɪd/
Adjective

stilted

  1. Making use of or possessing a stilt#Noun|stilt or stilts, or things resembling stilts; raise#Verb|raised on stilts.
    Antonyms: unstilted
    • 1741, [Edward Young], “Night the Sixth. The Infidel Reclaim’d. In Two Parts. Containing, the Nature, Proof, and Importance of Immortality. Part the First. […]”, in The Complaint: Or, Night-Thoughts on Life, Death, and Immortality, London: Printed for R[obert] Dodsley […], OCLC 1102704913 ↗, page 19 ↗:
      And laugh at this fantaſtic Mummery, / This antic Prelude of groteſque Events, / Where Dwarfs are often ſtilted, and betray / A Littleneſs of ſoul by Worlds o'er-run, / And Nations laid in blood.
    • 1822, [Walter Scott], chapter XII, in The Pirate. [...] In Three Volumes, volume I, Edinburgh: Printed [by James Ballantyne and Co.] for Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., OCLC 779274973 ↗, pages 272–273 ↗:
      As for her brother, they being now arrived where the rude and antique instruments of Zetland agriculture lay scattered in the usual confusion of a Scottish barn-yard, his thoughts were at once engrossed in the deficiencies of the one-stilted plough—of the twiscar, with which they dig peats—of the sledges, on which they transport commodities—of all and every thing, in short, in which the usages of the islands differed from that of the main land of Scotland.
      {small
  2. (figuratively) Elevated or raised in a contrived#Adjective|contrived or unnatural way; stiff#Adjective|stiff and artificially formal#Adjective|formal or pompous; also, depending on redundant, unnecessary elements.
    Antonyms: natural, unstilted
    He gave a stilted bow and left.
    • 1850, Herman Melville, “Some of the Ceremonies in a Man-of-War Unnecessary and Injurious”, in White-Jacket; or, The World in a Man-of-War, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, publishers; London: Richard Bentley, published 1855, OCLC 41502660 ↗, page 197 ↗:
      The general usages of the American Navy are founded upon the usages that prevailed in the Navy of monarchical England more than a century ago; nor have they been materially altered since. [...] [T]here still lingers in American men-of-war all the stilted etiquette and childish parade of the old-fashioned Spanish court of Madrid.
    • 1923, Compton Mackenzie, “The First Sermon”, in The Parson’s Progress, London; New York, N.Y.: Cassell and Company, OCLC 2004982 ↗, page 23 ↗:
      The stilted sentences of his written sermon seemed no longer worth the agony of descending that abyss of surge to rescue. He felt grateful to those flickering shapes of human beings below, and he was filled with a desire to talk to them simply for just as long as he felt they were listening to him.
  3. (architecture) Of a building#Noun|building or architectural feature#Noun|feature such as an arch#Noun|arch or vault#Noun|vault: support#Verb|supported by stilt; also (generally) having the main#Adjective|main part#Noun|part raised above the usual level#Noun|level by some structure#Noun|structure.
    Antonyms: unstilted
Translations
  • Italian: su pali
  • Russian: на сва́ях
Translations Translations
  • Italian: pomposo
  • Portuguese: pomposo
  • Russian: помпе́зный
  • Spanish: redicho
Verb
  1. Simple past tense and past participle of stilt



This text is extracted from the Wiktionary and it is available under the CC BY-SA 3.0 license | Terms and conditions | Privacy policy 0.003
Offline English dictionary