stool

Reading level: hard

Estimated CEFR level: B2 — Upper-Intermediate

Estimated from word frequency; not an official CEFR classification.

Definition

  1. noun a simple seat without a back or arms
  2. noun solid excretory product evacuated from the bowels
  3. noun (forestry) the stump of a tree that has been felled or headed for the production of saplings

Etymology

From Middle English stool, stole, stol, from Old English stōl (“chair, seat, throne”), from Proto-West Germanic *stōl, from Proto-Germanic *stōlaz (“chair”) (compare West Frisian stoel (“chair, seat”), Dutch stoel (“chair”), German Stuhl (“chair”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish stol (“chair”), Faroese stólur (“chair”), Icelandic stóll (“chair”), Finnish tuoli (“chair”), Estonian tool (“chair”)), from Proto-Indo-European *stoh₂los (compare Lithuanian stálas, Russian стол (stol, “table”), Russian стул (stul, “chair”), Serbo-Croatian stol (“table”), Slovene stol (“chair”), Albanian kështallë (“crutch”), Ancient Greek στήλη (stḗlē, “block of stone used as a prop or buttress to a wall”)), from *steh₂- (“to stand”). More at stand. The medical use derives from sense 2 (seat used for defecation).

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