Stop - Definition

n 1: the event of something ending; "it came to a stop at the
bottom of the hill" [syn: stop, halt]
2: the act of stopping something; "the third baseman made some
remarkable stops"; "his stoppage of the flow resulted in a
flood" [syn: stop, stoppage]
3: a brief stay in the course of a journey; "they made a
stopover to visit their friends" [syn: stop, stopover,
layover]
4: the state of inactivity following an interruption; "the
negotiations were in arrest"; "held them in check"; "during
the halt he got some lunch"; "the momentary stay enabled him
to escape the blow"; "he spent the entire stop in his seat"
[syn: arrest, check, halt, hitch, stay, stop,
stoppage]
5: a spot where something halts or pauses; "his next stop is
Atlanta"
6: a consonant produced by stopping the flow of air at some
point and suddenly releasing it; "his stop consonants are too
aspirated" [syn: stop consonant, stop, occlusive,
plosive consonant, plosive speech sound, plosive] [ant:
continuant, continuant consonant]
7: a punctuation mark (.) placed at the end of a declarative
sentence to indicate a full stop or after abbreviations; "in
England they call a period a stop" [syn: period, point,
full stop, stop, full point]
8: (music) a knob on an organ that is pulled to change the sound
quality from the organ pipes; "the organist pulled out all
the stops"
9: a mechanical device in a camera that controls size of
aperture of the lens; "the new cameras adjust the diaphragm
automatically" [syn: diaphragm, stop]
10: a restraint that checks the motion of something; "he used a
book as a stop to hold the door open" [syn: catch, stop]
11: an obstruction in a pipe or tube; "we had to call a plumber
to clear out the blockage in the drainpipe" [syn:
blockage, block, closure, occlusion, stop,
stoppage]
v 1: come to a halt, stop moving; "the car stopped"; "She
stopped in front of a store window" [syn: stop, halt]
[ant: get going, go, start]
2: put an end to a state or an activity; "Quit teasing your
little brother" [syn: discontinue, stop, cease, give
up, quit, lay off] [ant: bear on, carry on,
continue, preserve, uphold]
3: stop from happening or developing; "Block his election";
"Halt the process" [syn: stop, halt, block, kibosh]
4: interrupt a trip; "we stopped at Aunt Mary's house"; "they
stopped for three days in Florence" [syn: stop, stop
over]
5: cause to stop; "stop a car"; "stop the thief" [ant: start,
start up]
6: prevent completion; "stop the project"; "break off the
negotiations" [syn: break, break off, discontinue,
stop]
7: hold back, as of a danger or an enemy; check the expansion or
influence of; "Arrest the downward trend"; "Check the growth
of communism in South East Asia"; "Contain the rebel
movement"; "Turn back the tide of communism" [syn: check,
turn back, arrest, stop, contain, hold back]
8: seize on its way; "The fighter plane was ordered to intercept
an aircraft that had entered the country's airspace" [syn:
intercept, stop]
9: have an end, in a temporal, spatial, or quantitative sense;
either spatial or metaphorical; "the bronchioles terminate in
a capillary bed"; "Your rights stop where you infringe upon
the rights of other"; "My property ends by the bushes"; "The
symphony ends in a pianissimo" [syn: end, stop, finish,
terminate, cease] [ant: begin, start]
10: render unsuitable for passage; "block the way"; "barricade
the streets"; "stop the busy road" [syn: barricade,
block, blockade, stop, block off, block up, bar]
11: stop and wait, as if awaiting further instructions or
developments; "Hold on a moment!" [syn: hold on, stop]