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

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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

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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

Congress often uses it as the threshold for a host of phase-ins, phaseouts and other provisions to raise revenue or stanch revenue loss.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2026

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

From Slate ● Apr. 20, 2026

She ran to a portable toilet and grabbed a handful of paper towels to stanch the bleeding.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 20, 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

Wordsworth had no stancher friend, his poetry had no more delicate critic, than Charles Lamb; and Lamb wrote thus in 1815 to Wordsworth about "Alice Fell" and the assailants of the poem.

From The Galaxy Vol. XXIII?March, 1877.?No. 3 by Various

He saw his son Kit more than once or twice in those days, and Kit appeared to be the stancher patriot of the two.

From The Landleaguers by Anthony Trollope

It is larger than the common springer, and stancher, and stouter.

From The Dog by William Youatt

The wish was only increased when the first Maid of the Mist was superseded by the new and stancher one.

From The Falls of Niagara and Other Famous Cataracts by George W. Holley

"An' she's stancher--a wonderful lot stancher," continued the other.

From The Gaunt Gray Wolf A Tale of Adventure With Ungava Bob by Dillon Wallace

In a worldwide broadcast after the war began a fortnight ago, Communism's stanchest foe, Pope Pius, left Hitler's crusade strictly alone, spoke no word that could possibly be stretched to favor the Nazi campaign.

From Time Magazine Archive

Last week, at Lahore, the fruitful work of Sir Sikander was ended: a sudden heart attack brought death to Britain's stanchest friend in India.

From Time Magazine Archive

Her stanchest admirers were the President's grandchildren, Sistie and Buzzie Dall.

From Time Magazine Archive

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

In an hour hence," said Regnar, "no human being can stand where we are now, and you can walk the stanchest hound over the ledge, without his dreaming of what lies beneath.

From Adrift in the Ice-Fields by Charles W. Hall

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