stitch
pronunciation
How to pronounce stitch in British English:
UK [stɪtʃ]
How to pronounce stitch in American English:
US [stɪtʃ]
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- Noun:
- sewing consisting of a link or loop or knot made by drawing a threaded needle through a fabric
- a sharp spasm of pain in the side resulting from running
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- Verb:
- fasten by sewing; do needlework
Word Origin
- stitch
- stitch: [OE] Stitch was originally a noun, meaning ‘sting, prick’ (a sense which survives in the very specialized application to a ‘pain in the side, caused by exertion’). It came from a prehistoric Germanic *stikiz, which was formed from the base *stik- ‘pierce, prick’ (source also of English stick). Its use as a verb, denoting ‘join with thread by piercing with a needle’, emerged at the beginning of the 13th century, and the sewing sense fed back into the noun.=> stick
- stitch (n.)
- Old English stice "a prick, puncture, sting, stab," from Proto-Germanic *stikiz (cognates: Old Frisian steke, Old High German stih, German Stich "a pricking, prick, sting, stab"), from PIE *stig-i-, from root *steig- "to stick; pointed" (see stick (v.)). The sense of "sudden, stabbing pain in the side" was in late Old English. Senses in sewing and shoemaking first recorded late 13c.; meaning "bit of clothing one is (or isn't) wearing" is from c. 1500. Meaning "a stroke of work" (of any kind) is attested from 1580s. Surgical sense first recorded 1520s. Sense of "amusing person or thing" is 1968, from notion of laughing so much one gets stitches of pain (cognates: verbal expression to have (someone) in stitches, 1935).
- stitch (v.)
- c. 1200, "to stab, pierce," also "to fasten or adorn with stitches;" see stitch (n.). Surgical sense is from 1570s. Related: Stitched; stitcher; stitching.
Example
- 1. For this project , she added a stitch every three stitches .
- 2. Stitch by stitch , germany is unravelling the carefully knitted deal that offered the euro zone the best chance yet of overcoming its crisis .
- 3. Letting asian workers stitch and glue sports shoes makes it possible for such firms to employ europeans to design and market them .
- 4. Important thangkas are embroidered on transferred outlines ; some of them use a great variety of stitch patterns such as flat and piled stitches to give them a three-dimensional effect .
- 5. At one of those factories in an industrial suburb of the southern chinese city of guangzhou , a worker uses a sewing machine to stitch together black padding for an orthopedic foot brace .