sty

plural sties · alternative stye

1. A pen or enclosure for swine.

   "That's the sty, obviously," the dean replied impatiently. [...] "You have a sty?" I persisted. "Like for pigs?"

   2026, Gordon Korman, Hypergifted, page 24

   Synonyms: pigpen, pigsty

2. figurativelyA messy, dirty or debauched place.

   To roll with pleasure in a sensual sty.

   Comus

   1634 October 9 (first performance; Gregorian calendar), [John Milton], edited by H[enry] Lawes, A Maske Presented at Ludlow Castle, 1634: […] [Comus], London: […] [Augustine Matthews] for Hvmphrey Robinson, […], published 1637, →OCLC; reprinted as Comus: […] (Dodd, Mead & Company’s Facsimile Reprints of Rare Books; Literature Series; no. I), New York, N.Y.: Dodd, Mead & Company, 1903, →OCLC

   Synonyms: hovel, pigsty

present singular third person sties · participle present stying · participle past stied · past stied · alternative stye

1. transitiveTo place in, or as if in, a sty.

   and here you sty me In this hard rock, whiles you do keep from me The rest o' the island

   1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act I, scene ii]

2. transitiveTo live in a sty, or any messy or dirty place.

present singular third person sties · participle present stying · participle past stied · past stied · alternative stee · alternative stie · alternative stigh · alternative stye

1. obsoleteTo ascend, rise up, climb.First known use 9th–17th c.

   That she might sty to the seat of Beatifick Mirth.

   1652, Edward Benlowes, Theophila, or Love's Sacrifice

   3 more examples

   The beast impatient of his smarting wound, / And of so fierce and forcible despight, / Thought with his wings to stye aboue the ground [...].

   1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IX”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC

   From this lower tract he dared to stie up to the clowdes.

   1591, Ed[mund] Sp[enser], “Muiopotmos, or The Fate of the Butterflie”, in Complaints. Containing Sundrie Small Poemes of the Worlds Vanitie. […], London: […] William Ponsonbie, […], →OCLC

   Led along, as some Creatures are, by the Noses, and voluntarily hood-winked; or like seeled Doves, sty up, you know not whither, nor how far.

   1621, Richard Montague, Diatribae upon the first part of the late History of Tithes

plural sties

1. UKdialectalA ladder.

plural sties · alternative stye

1. medicineAn inflammation of the eyelid.