stanch

¹ American  

[stawnch, stanch, stahnch] / stɔntʃ, stæntʃ, stɑntʃ /

Also staunch

verb (used with object)

1. to stop the flow of (a liquid, especially blood).

2. to stop the flow of blood or other liquid from (a wound, leak, etc.).

3. Archaic. to check, allay, or extinguish.

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verb (used without object)

1. to stop flowing, as blood; be stanched.

noun

1. Also called navigation weir, flash-lock. a lock that, after being partially emptied, is opened suddenly to send a boat over a shallow place with a rush of water.

stanch ² American  

[stawnch, stahnch, stanch] / stɔntʃ, stɑntʃ, stæntʃ /

adjective

stancher, stanchest

1. staunch.

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stanch British  

/ stɑːntʃ, stɔːntʃ /

verb

1. to stem the flow of (a liquid, esp blood) or (of a liquid) to stop flowing

2. to prevent the flow of a liquid, esp blood, from (a hole, wound, etc)

3. an archaic word for assuage

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noun

1. a primitive form of lock in which boats are carried over shallow parts of a river in a rush of water released by the lock

Other Word Forms

• stancher
  noun
• stanchness
  noun
• stanchable
  adjective
• unstanchable
  adjective
• stanchly
  adverb

Etymology

Origin of stanch

First recorded in 1275–1325; Middle English stanchen, staunchen (verb) < Old French estanchier “to close, stop, slake (thirst),” from Vulgar Latin stanticāre (unattested), equivalent to Latin stant- (stem of stāns, present participle of stāre to stand ) + -icāre causative suffix

Explanation

Use the verb stanch to describe stopping a liquid from spreading. A bandage can stanch bleeding and thick towels can stanch the flow of water across the kitchen floor when you drop a full glass of water. The vowel sound in stanch most frequently sounds like on: "stonch." Stanch can also be pronounced to rhyme with branch. Though it's a verb mostly commonly associated with keeping blood from flowing from a wound, the origin is likely the Latin word stagnum, meaning "pond, pool." This word is related to stagnate, describing water that has no movement.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

stanch stancher stanchest

But the deregulation they won did little to stanch the bleeding.

From Slate ● Apr. 20, 2026

Meanwhile, the perversion of ordinary goods to serve a fully militarized state is encapsulated in the difficulty the boy has in finding white flour: None is available because it’s being used to stanch wounds.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 16, 2026

The sale could help stanch losses from last year’s box-office flop “Megalopolis,” which cost over $120 million to make and was largely financed by the 86-year-old director.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 24, 2025

Parentez said Martinez drove herself to a nearby auto shop, where employees used shop towels to stanch her wounds until paramedics arrived.

From Salon ● Oct. 7, 2025

She put pressure on the cut to stanch the bleeding and went over to the sink, turned on the faucet, and thrust her hand under the stream of water.

From "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston

The canoe and pirogue could handle the packs and kegs brought westward by the files of Indian ponies; but the heavy loads of the Conestoga wagons demanded stancher craft.

From The Paths of Inland Commerce; a chronicle of trail, road, and waterway by Archer Butler Hulbert

All Lima knew that Peru did not contain a stancher Royalist than Rosa Montilla.

From At the Point of the Sword by Herbert Hayens

Through all of his hilarious experiences at Fardale, Frank had not a stancher adherent.

From Frank Merriwell's Reward by Burt L. Standish

"They could not have a stancher or prettier champion, my dear," said a gray-haired man who sat near me.

From The Mistress of Bonaventure by Harold Bindloss

There were no stancher adherents of the democratic idea than our intellectual aristocrats.

From The American Mind The E. T. Earl Lectures by Bliss Perry

Perfectly representative of the club's spirit are the well-known lines of one of their stanchest and most sentimental members, the late Don Marquis: A Certain Club Ah, dead and done!

From Time Magazine Archive

This did him no harm with the thousands of Texas Mexicans who are now his stanchest supporters.

From Time Magazine Archive

Distinguished lawyer-Democrat, in 1918 he ran against Alfred E. Smith in the gubernatorial primary and was so impressed by his defeat that he became one of Governor Smith's stanchest supporters.

From Time Magazine Archive

When Quanah sang his deep-throated lament over her body, even the stanchest cowhands in the audience had to blow their noses.

From Time Magazine Archive

No wonder that such extreme provocation should try the patience of all but the stanchest disciples.

From Old-Fashioned Ethics and Common-Sense Metaphysics With Some of Their Applications by William Thomas Thornton