Meaning

The stock of a family; a race or generation of progenitors..

Definitions by Sense

1. The stock of a family; a race or generation of progenitors.
2. A branch of a family.
3. An advanced or leading position; the lookout.
4. (botany) The above-ground stalk (technically axis) of a vascular plant, and certain anatomically similar, below-ground organs such as rhizomes, bulbs, tubers, and corms.
5. A slender supporting member of an individual part of a plant such as a flower or a leaf; also, by analogy, the shaft of a feather.
6. A narrow part on certain man-made objects, such as a wine glass, a tobacco pipe, a spoon.
7. (linguistics) The main part of an uninflected word to which affixes may be added to form inflections of the word. A stem often has a more fundamental root. Systematic conjugations and declensions derive from their stems.
8. (slang) A person's leg.

Example Sentences

Where ye may all that are of noble ſtemm / Approach, and kiſs her ſacred veſtures hemm.

While I do pray, learn here thy stem / And true descent.

This is a stem / Of that victorious stock.

Wolsey sat at the stem more than twenty years.

After they are shot up thirty feet in length, they spread a very large top, having no bough nor twig in the trunk or the stem.

He had placed her upon the grass by now, her back resting against the stem of a huge tree. At her question he stepped back where he could the better see her face.

the stem of an apple or a cherry

Earless ghost swift moths become “invisible” to echolocating bats by forming mating clusters close (less than half a meter) above vegetation and effectively blending into the clutter of echoes that the bat receives from the leaves and stems around them.

Word Forms

• stems
• stemming
• stemmed

Synonyms for stem

Antonyms for stem

Related Words

When Should You Use Stem?

Use stem when its meaning, tone and grammar fit the full sentence. A synonym is not always a direct replacement.

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