STOW

Pronunciation (US):

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 Dictionary entry overview: What does stow mean? 

• STOW (verb)
  The verb STOW has 1 sense:

1. fill by packing tightly

  Familiarity information: STOW used as a verb is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• STOW (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they stow    ... he / she / it stows   
Past simple: stowed   
Past participle: stowed   
-ing form: stowing   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Fill by packing tightly

Classified under:

Verbs of touching, hitting, tying, digging

Context example:

stow the cart

Hypernyms (to "stow" is one way to...):

pack (arrange in a container)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s something
Somebody ----s something PP

Derivation:

stowage; stowing (the act of packing or storing away)

 Context examples 

Come, come, said Silver; stow this talk.

(Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson)

You'll be surprised how those girls are stowed away.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

I stowed them all discreetly away in my overcoat and drove straight to the address given.

(His Last Bow, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Stow that! Are you going to take up your duties as cabin-boy? Or do I have to take you in hand?

(The Sea-Wolf, by Jack London)

He was in no friendly mood, when just at full tide, the thin man came up the gang-plank again and asked to see where his box had been stowed.

(Dracula, by Bram Stoker)

Ruth's promised cure for the habit, flamboyantly labelled, he stowed away in the most inaccessible corner of his bureau.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

Adele, when lifted in, commenced kissing me, by way of expressing her gratitude for my intercession: she was instantly stowed away into a corner on the other side of him.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

I rested two or three minutes, and then gave the boat another shove, and so on, till the sea was no higher than my arm-pits; and now, the most laborious part being over, I took out my other cables, which were stowed in one of the ships, and fastened them first to the boat, and then to nine of the vessels which attended me; the wind being favourable, the seamen towed, and I shoved, until we arrived within forty yards of the shore; and, waiting till the tide was out, I got dry to the boat, and by the assistance of two thousand men, with ropes and engines, I made a shift to turn it on its bottom, and found it was but little damaged.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

The sham chaplain came into our cells to exhort us, carrying a black bag, supposed to be full of tracts, and so often did he come that by the third day we had each stowed away at the foot of our beds a file, a brace of pistols, a pound of powder, and twenty slugs.

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

“Mas'r Davy,” Ham whispered, drawing me aside, while Mr. Peggotty was stowing his bag among the luggage, his life is quite broke up.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)