stir

stir
    n 1: a prominent or sensational but short-lived news event; "he
         made a great splash and then disappeared" [syn: {stir},
         {splash}]
    2: emotional agitation and excitement
    3: a rapid active commotion [syn: {bustle}, {hustle}, {flurry},
       {ado}, {fuss}, {stir}]
    v 1: move an implement through; "stir the soup"; "stir my
         drink"; "stir the soil"
    2: move very slightly; "He shifted in his seat" [syn: {stir},
       {shift}, {budge}, {agitate}]
    3: stir feelings in; "stimulate my appetite"; "excite the
       audience"; "stir emotions" [syn: {stimulate}, {excite},
       {stir}]
    4: stir the feelings, emotions, or peace of; "These stories
       shook the community"; "the civil war shook the country" [syn:
       {stimulate}, {shake}, {shake up}, {excite}, {stir}]
    5: affect emotionally; "A stirring movie"; "I was touched by
       your kind letter of sympathy" [syn: {touch}, {stir}]
    6: summon into action or bring into existence, often as if by
       magic; "raise the specter of unemployment"; "he conjured wild
       birds in the air"; "call down the spirits from the mountain"
       [syn: {raise}, {conjure}, {conjure up}, {invoke}, {evoke},
       {stir}, {call down}, {arouse}, {bring up}, {put forward},
       {call forth}]
    7: to begin moving, "As the thunder started the sleeping
       children began to stir" [syn: {arouse}, {stir}]
    8: mix or add by stirring; "Stir nuts into the dough"
    

Stir \Stir\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. {Stirred}; p. pr. & vb. n.
   {Stirring}.] [OE. stiren, steren, sturen, AS. styrian;
   probably akin to D. storen to disturb, G. st["o]ren, OHG.
   st[=o]ren to scatter, destroy. [root]166.]
   1. To change the place of in any manner; to move.
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            My foot I had never yet in five days been able to
            stir.                                 --Sir W.
                                                  Temple.
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   2. To disturb the relative position of the particles of, as
      of a liquid, by passing something through it; to agitate;
      as, to stir a pudding with a spoon.
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            My mind is troubled, like a fountain stirred.
                                                  --Shak.
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   3. To bring into debate; to agitate; to moot.
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            Stir not questions of jurisdiction.   --Bacon.
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   4. To incite to action; to arouse; to instigate; to prompt;
      to excite. "To stir men to devotion." --Chaucer.
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            An Ate, stirring him to blood and strife. --Shak.
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            And for her sake some mutiny will stir. --Dryden.
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   Note: In all senses except the first, stir is often followed
         by up with an intensive effect; as, to stir up fire; to
         stir up sedition.
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   Syn: To move; incite; awaken; rouse; animate; stimulate;
        excite; provoke.
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Stir \Stir\, n.
   1. The act or result of stirring; agitation; tumult; bustle;
      noise or various movements.
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            Why all these words, this clamor, and this stir?
                                                  --Denham.
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            Consider, after so much stir about genus and
            species, how few words we have yet settled
            definitions of.                       --Locke.
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   2. Public disturbance or commotion; tumultuous disorder;
      seditious uproar.
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            Being advertised of some stirs raised by his
            unnatural sons in England.            --Sir J.
                                                  Davies.
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   3. Agitation of thoughts; conflicting passions.
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Stir \Stir\, v. i.
   1. To move; to change one's position.
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            I had not power to stir or strive,
            But felt that I was still alive.      --Byron.
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   2. To be in motion; to be active or bustling; to exert or
      busy one's self.
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            All are not fit with them to stir and toil. --Byron.
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            The friends of the unfortunate exile, far from
            resenting his unjust suspicions, were stirring
            anxiously in his behalf.              --Merivale.
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   3. To become the object of notice; to be on foot.
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            They fancy they have a right to talk freely upon
            everything that stirs or appears.     --I. Watts.
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   4. To rise, or be up, in the morning. [Colloq.] --Shak.
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351 Moby Thesaurus words for "stir":
      action, activate, activeness, activism, activity, actuate,
      actuation, ado, advance, affect, agitate, agitation, amalgamate,
      animate, annoy, arise, arouse, ascend, awake, awaken, back,
      back up, be turbulent, beat, beat up, bestir, big house, blend,
      blow the coals, blow up, bluster, bobbery, boil, boiling, bother,
      botheration, brawl, brig, broil, brouhaha, budge, burst, business,
      bustle, calaboose, call forth, call up, can, challenge, change,
      change place, chokey, churn, churn up, circle, climb, clink,
      come alive, come home to, commingle, commotion, confusion,
      conturbation, convince, convulse, cooler, coop, cultivate, descend,
      din, disarrange, discombobulate, discompose, discomposure,
      disconcert, disorder, disquiet, disquietude, disturb, disturbance,
      doings, donnybrook, donnybrook fair, drive, dustup, dynamics, ebb,
      ebullience, ebullition, eddy, effervescence, electrify,
      embroilment, encourage, energize, enkindle, enrage, excite,
      excitement, fan, fan the fire, fan the flame, feed the fire,
      feery-fary, ferment, fermentation, fever, feverishness,
      fidgetiness, fidgets, fire, fit, flame, flap, flow, flurry,
      fluster, flutter, flutteration, flutteriness, foam, foment,
      foofaraw, fracas, free-for-all, frenzy, fret, fume, furore, fuss,
      fussiness, galvanize, get, get moving, get over, get up,
      glasshouse, go, go around, go deep, go round, go sideways,
      go through one, going, goings-on, gyrate, hassle, heat,
      helter-skelter, hoosegow, hubbub, hullabaloo, hurly-burly, hurry,
      hurry-scurry, impassion, impel, incense, incite, induce, inflame,
      infuriate, inquietude, inspire, instigate, intermingle, jar,
      jitters, jolt, jug, jumpiness, keep, key up, kindle, kinematics,
      kinesipathy, kinesis, kinesitherapy, kinetics, lather up,
      light the fuse, light up, look lively, madden, maelstrom,
      make sensitive, malaise, melee, melt, melt the heart, merge,
      militancy, mill, mill around, mingle, mix up, mobilization, moil,
      motion, motivate, motivation, mount, move, move over, movement,
      moving, nerviness, nervosity, nervousness, overexcite, paddle,
      pandemonium, pell-mell, pen, penetrate, penitentiary, persuade,
      perturb, perturbate, perturbation, pierce, pique, plunge, pokey,
      political activism, pother, prison, proceedings, prod, progress,
      prompt, provoke, quicken, quod, racket, raise, raise up, rally,
      rampage, rattle, refine, regress, restlessness, resuscitate,
      retrogress, revive, rile, riot, ripple, rise, rock, roil, rotate,
      rough-and-tumble, roughen, roughhouse, rouse, rout, row, ruckus,
      ruction, ruffle, rumple, rumpus, run, running, scramble, seethe,
      seething, sensibilize, sensitize, set astir, set fire to, set on,
      set on fire, shake, shake a leg, shake up, sharpen, shift, shindy,
      shock, simmer, sink, slammer, smart, smolder, soar, soften, spasm,
      spin, spur, spurt, stagger, steam up, step lively, stew, stimulate,
      sting, stir about, stir the blood, stir the embers,
      stir the feelings, stir up, stirring, stream, subside, summon up,
      sweat, swirl, swirling, to-do, touch, touch a chord, travel,
      trepidation, trepidity, trouble, tumult, tumultuation, turbidity,
      turbulence, turmoil, turn on, twitter, unease, unquiet, unrest,
      unsettle, uproar, upset, urge, velocity, vitalize, vortex, wake,
      wake up, waken, wane, warm, warm the blood, whet, whip, whip up,
      whirl, whirlpool, whirlwind, whisk, work into, work up,
      yeastiness