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Stain   /steɪn/   Listen
noun
Stain  n.  
1.
A discoloration by foreign matter; a spot; as, a stain on a garment or cloth.
2.
A natural spot of a color different from the gound. "Swift trouts, diversified with crimson stains."
3.
Taint of guilt; tarnish; disgrace; reproach. "Nor death itself can wholly wash their stains." "Our opinion... is, I trust, without any blemish or stain of heresy."
4.
Cause of reproach; shame.
5.
A tincture; a tinge. (R.) "You have some stain of soldier in you."
Synonyms: Blot; spot; taint; pollution; blemish; tarnish; color; disgrace; infamy; shame.


verb
Stain  v. t.  (past & past part. stained; pres. part. staining)  
1.
To discolor by the application of foreign matter; to make foul; to spot; as, to stain the hand with dye; armor stained with blood.
2.
To color, as wood, glass, paper, cloth, or the like, by processes affecting, chemically or otherwise, the material itself; to tinge with a color or colors combining with, or penetrating, the substance; to dye; as, to stain wood with acids, colored washes, paint rubbed in, etc.; to stain glass.
3.
To spot with guilt or infamy; to bring reproach on; to blot; to soil; to tarnish. "Of honor void, Of innocence, of faith, of purity, Our wonted ornaments now soiled and stained."
4.
To cause to seem inferior or soiled by comparison. "She stains the ripest virgins of her age." "That did all other beasts in beauty stain."
Stained glass, glass colored or stained by certain metallic pigments fused into its substance, often used for making ornamental windows.
Synonyms: To paint; dye; blot; soil; sully; discolor; disgrace; taint. Paint, Stain, Dye. These denote three different processes; the first mechanical, the other two, chiefly chemical. To paint a thing is to spread a coat of coloring matter over it; to stain or dye a thing is to impart color to its substance. To stain is said chiefly of solids, as wood, glass, paper; to dye, of fibrous substances, textile fabrics, etc.; the one, commonly, a simple process, as applying a wash; the other more complex, as fixing colors by mordants.


Stain  v. i.  To give or receive a stain; to grow dim.





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Stain" Quotes from Famous Books



... and two or three other men, declared very positively that they had seen little Wings beating himself against the coal-box; and one of them pointed out to Mr. Parlin the blood-stain on the edge ...
— Little Prudy's Dotty Dimple • Sophie May
... was silence before the first chords rang softly through the room. Though it may have been that the absence of necessity to strive and stain her daintiness amidst the press was responsible for much, Hetty Torrance's voice had failed to win her fame; but she sang and played better than most well-trained amateurs. Thus there was no rustle of drapery or ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... fallacious under the Leads, where nothing is done after the natural order. I imagined the Inquisitors must have discovered my innocence and the wrong they had done me, and that they only kept me in prison for form's sake, and to protect their repute from the stain of committing injustice; hence I concluded that they would give me my freedom when they laid down their tyrannical authority. My mind was so composed and quiet that I felt as if I could forgive them, ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... apologists of "the sea-green incorruptible," it must be admitted, have not been very successful, as the sence of mankind revolts at indiscriminate murder, even when the murderer's hands have no other stain than that which comes from blood,—for that is a stain which will not "out"; not even printer's ink can erase or cover it; and the attorney of Arras must remain the Raw-Head and Bloody-Bones of history. Benedict ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 57, July, 1862 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... thither to Slavery by the Protector. My Friend being at that time about Twelve Years old, chose rather to share his Fathers Fate, and view the Western parts of the Worlds, than fall into the Hands of a Person who would stain the Beauty of his tender Mind, by giving him an unsuitable Education. After he had buried his Father in Virginia, he took the Opportunity of a French Vessel to pass over to Brest, and so to Paris, who by the Assistance ...
— Memoirs of Major Alexander Ramkins (1718) • Daniel Defoe


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