Adjective

(er)

Having or revealing little emotion or sensibility.

* 1857 , ", verse 2.

Light laughs the breeze

In her Castle above them —

Babbles the Bee in a stolid Ear,

Pipe the Sweet Birds in ignorant cadence —

Ah, what sagacity perished here!

* 1898 , ,

They (Eloi) all failed to understand my gestures; some were simply stolid , some thought it was a jest and laughed at me.

* 1950 , Ray Bradbury, ,

With his symbolic helmet numbered 451 on his stolid head, and his eyes all orange flame with the thought of what came next, he flicked the igniter and the house jumped up in a gorging fire that burned the evening sky red and yellow and black.

Adjective

(en adjective)

(archaic): Lacking confidence in others; distrustful.

Lacking confidence in one's self; distrustful of one's own powers; not self-reliant; timid; modest; bashful; characterized by modest reserve.

*

Having therefore—but hold, as we are diffident of our own abilities, let us here invite a superior power to our assistance.

* {{quote-book

, year=1960 , author= , title=(Jeeves in the Offing) , section=chapter VIII , passage=At an early point in these exchanges I had started to sidle to the door, and I now sidled through it, rather like a diffident crab on some sandy beach trying to avoid the attentions of a child with a spade.}}