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Stern vs Stark - What's the difference?

stern | stark |

As a noun stern

is a star; a small luminous dot that can be seen on the night sky.

As a proper noun stark is

.

stern

English

Etymology 1

From (etyl) stern, sterne, sturne, from (etyl) .

Adjective

(er)
  • Having a hardness and severity of nature or manner.
  • * (John Dryden)
  • stern as tutors, and as uncles hard
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-22, volume=407, issue=8841, page=76, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= Snakes and ladders , passage=Risk is everywhere. From tabloid headlines insisting that coffee causes cancer (yesterday, of course, it cured it) to stern government warnings about alcohol and driving, the world is teeming with goblins.}}
  • Grim and forbidding in appearance.
  • * (William Wordsworth)
  • these barren rocks, your stern inheritance

    Etymology 2

    Most likely from (etyl) , from the same Germanic root.

    Noun

    (wikipedia stern) (en noun)
  • (nautical) The rear part or after end of a ship or vessel.
  • * , chapter=7
  • , title= Mr. Pratt's Patients , passage=Old Applegate, in the stern', just set and looked at me, and Lord James, amidship, waved both arms and kept hollering for help. I took a couple of everlasting big strokes and managed to grab hold of the skiff's rail, close to the ' stern .}}
  • (figurative) The post of management or direction.
  • * (William Shakespeare)
  • and sit chiefest stern of public weal
  • The hinder part of anything.
  • (Spenser)
  • The tail of an animal; now used only of the tail of a dog.
  • Antonyms
    * bow
    Derived terms
    * from stem to stern * sternpost
    See also
    * keel

    Etymology 3

    (etyl)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • A bird, the black tern.
  • Anagrams

    * * * * ---- ==Mòcheno==

    Noun

    (m)
  • (l) (luminous dot appearing in the night sky)
  • References

    *

    stark

    English

    Etymology 1

    From (etyl) stark, starc, from (etyl) stearc, . Related to (l). Modifying naked , an alternation of original .

    Adjective

    (er)
  • (obsolete) Hard, firm; obdurate.
  • Severe; violent; fierce (now usually in describing the weather).
  • * {{quote-magazine, title=The climate of Tibet: Pole-land
  • , date=2013-05-11, volume=407, issue=8835, page=80 , magazine=(The Economist) citation , passage=Of all the transitions brought about on the Earth’s surface by temperature change, the melting of ice into water is the starkest . It is binary. And for the land beneath, the air above and the life around, it changes everything.}}
  • (rare) Strong; vigorous; powerful.
  • * Sir Walter Scott
  • a stark , moss-trooping Scot
  • * Beaumont and Fletcher
  • Stark beer, boy, stout and strong beer.
  • Stiff, rigid.
  • * Spenser
  • Whose senses all were straight benumbed and stark .
  • * Shakespeare
  • Many a nobleman lies stark and stiff / Under the hoofs of vaunting enemies.
  • * Ben Jonson
  • The north is not so stark and cold.
  • Hard in appearance; barren, desolate.
  • I picked my way forlornly through the stark , sharp rocks.
  • Complete, absolute, full.
  • I screamed in stark terror.
    A flower was growing, in stark contrast, out of the sidewalk.
  • * Ben Jonson
  • Consider the stark security / The common wealth is in now.
  • * Collier
  • He pronounces the citation stark nonsense.
  • * Selden
  • Rhetoric is very good or stark naught; there's no medium in rhetoric.
    Derived terms
    * (l)

    Adverb

    (-)
  • starkly; entirely, absolutely
  • He's gone stark , staring mad.
    She was just standing there, stark naked.
  • * Fuller
  • held him strangled in his arms till he was stark dead.
  • * {{quote-book, year=1913, author=
  • , title=Lord Stranleigh Abroad , chapter=4 citation , passage=“… That woman is stark mad, Lord Stranleigh. Her own father recognised it when he bereft her of all power in the great business he founded. …”}}
    Usage notes
    In standard modern English, the adverb is essentially restricted to stark naked'' and phrases meaning "crazy" on the pattern of ''stark raving mad .

    Etymology 2

    From (etyl) starken, from (etyl) .

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • (obsolete, or, dialect) To stiffen.
  • Anagrams

    * * ----