STAGNANT

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does stagnant mean? 

• STAGNANT (adjective)
  The adjective STAGNANT has 2 senses:

1. not circulating or flowing

2. not growing or changing; without force or vitality

  Familiarity information: STAGNANT used as an adjective is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• STAGNANT (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Not circulating or flowing

Synonyms:

dead; stagnant

Context example:

stagnant water

Similar:

standing ((of fluids) not moving or flowing)

Derivation:

stagnancy (inactivity of liquids; being stagnant; standing still; without current or circulation)

stagnate (cease to flow; stand without moving)

stagnate (cause to stagnate)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Not growing or changing; without force or vitality

Synonyms:

moribund; stagnant

Similar:

adynamic; undynamic (characterized by an absence of force or forcefulness)

Derivation:

stagnancy (a state of inactivity (in business or art etc))

stagnate (stand still)

 Context examples 

Even the most insignificant problem would be welcome in these stagnant days.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

One might have thought already that God’s curse hung heavy over a degenerate world, for there was an awesome hush and a feeling of vague expectancy in the sultry and stagnant air.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The few hours that had passed since he saw the Abbey tower stretched out in his memory until they outgrew whole months of the stagnant life of the cloister.

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

The Aedes aegypti mosquito, which transmits Zika, dengue and chikungunya as well as yellow fever, lays eggs on damp surfaces and small bodies of stagnant water.

(Thyme oil and corn starch prove deadly for mosquito larvae, SciDev.Net)

In our own case the excellent engines of the Esmeralda could disregard the sluggish flow of the stream, and we made as rapid progress as if we were navigating a stagnant lake.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

A peculiar stagnant smell hung over the anchorage—a smell of sodden leaves and rotting tree trunks.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

The attitude had drawn all the stagnant blood to the face, and no man could have recognised that distorted liver-coloured countenance; but his height, his dress, and his hair were all sufficient to show my client, when we had drawn the body up, that it was indeed his missing butler.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

It was difficult to realise as we looked at the line of fine shops and stately business premises that they really abutted on the other side upon the faded and stagnant square which we had just quitted.

(The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

None of the others had met the Count at all at close quarters, and when I had seen him he was either in the fasting stage of his existence in his rooms or, when he was gloated with fresh blood, in a ruined building open to the air; but here the place was small and close, and the long disuse had made the air stagnant and foul.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

It was bowl-shaped and at the bottom, some hundreds of yards from where we lay, were pools of green-scummed, stagnant water, fringed with bullrushes.

(The Lost World, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)