Adjacent Words

stifling definitions

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WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: characterized by oppressive heat and humidity; "the summer was sultry and oppressive"; "the stifling atmosphere"; "the sulfurous atmosphere preceding a thunderstorm" [syn: sultry, stifling, sulfurous, sulphurous] n
1: forceful prevention; putting down by power or authority; "the suppression of heresy"; "the quelling of the rebellion"; "the stifling of all dissent" [syn: suppression, crushing, quelling, stifling]

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Stifle Sti"fle, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Stifled; p. pr. & vb. n. Stifling.] [Freq. of OE. stif stiff; cf. Icel. st[=i]fla to dam up.] 1. To stop the breath of by crowding something into the windpipe, or introducing an irrespirable substance into the lungs; to choke; to suffocate; to cause the death of by such means; as, to stifle one with smoke or dust. Stifled with kisses, a sweet death he dies. --Dryden. I took my leave, being half stifled with the closeness of the room. --Swift. 2. To stop; to extinguish; to deaden; to quench; as, to stifle the breath; to stifle a fire or flame. Bodies . . . stifle in themselves the rays which they do not reflect or transmit. --Sir I. Newton. 3. To suppress the manifestation or report of; to smother; to conceal from public knowledge; as, to stifle a story; to stifle passion. I desire only to have things fairly represented as they really are; no evidence smothered or stifled. --Waterland.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. Stifling heat is so intense that it makes you feel uncomfortable. You can also use stifling to describe a place that is extremely hot. The stifling heat of the little room was beginning to make me nauseous. ADJ 2. If a situation is stifling, it makes you feel uncomfortable because you cannot do what you want. Life at home with her parents and two sisters was stifling. ...a stifling bureaucracy. ADJ 3. see also stifle

Moby Thesaurus

airless, breathless, breezeless, choking, close, constrictive, contrary, counterproductive, crosswise, extinguishment, hindering, hindersome, humid, ill-ventilated, in the way, inhibiting, inhibitive, interrupting, interruptive, muggy, obstructing, obstructive, obstruent, occlusive, oppressive, overpowering, quashing, quenching, repressive, restrictive, smothering, smudgy, squashing, squelching, sticky, strangling, stuffy, suffocating, sultry, suppression, suppressive, troublesome, unbearable, unendurable, unvented, unventilated, windless