stalemate
pronunciation
How to pronounce stalemate in British English:
UK [ˈsteɪlmeɪt]
How to pronounce stalemate in American English:
US [ˈstelˌmet]
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- Noun:
- a situation in which no progress can be made or no advancement is possible
- drawing position in chess: any of a player's possible moves would place his king in check
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- Verb:
- subject to a stalemate
Word Origin
- stalemate
- stalemate: [18] Stalemate is a compound noun, based on the now obsolete stale ‘stalemate’. And this in turn was probably borrowed from Anglo- Norman estale ‘fixed position’, a derivative of Old French estaler ‘halt’, which also underlies English stale and stall. So etymologically, when you reach stalemate in chess, you have to ‘stand’ or ‘halt’ where you are, going neither forward nor back.
- stalemate (n.)
- 1765, in chess, from stale "stalemate" (early 15c.) + mate (n.2) "checkmate." Middle English stale is probably from Anglo-French estale "standstill" (see stall (n.2)). A misnomer, because a stale is not a mate. "In England from the 17th c. to the beginning of the 19th c. the player who received stalemate won the game" [OED]. Figurative sense is recorded from 1885. As a verb from 1765; figurative from 1861.
Example
- 1. It demonstrates the stalemate in the international financial system .
- 2. Stalemate is nothing new in albany , the capital of new york state .
- 3. The absurd political stalemate has also left its scars .
- 4. Many republican grandees blame the romney campaign for the stalemate .
- 5. But the parties reached a stalemate on a federalist structure .