Word.ws English Dictionary

stang

/ˈstæŋ/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/ˈstaŋ/

stang noun: a forked ritual staff. Also the simple past of sting.

Noun

stang (plural stangs)

  1. A forked ritual staff.
    • The stang represents the horned god and the masculine force of nature. Much like the wand or athame, the stang is used for raising or directing power[…]2006 January 7, Lady Sabrina, Exploring Wicca, Updated Edition, →ISBN, page 87
    • In more common (and private) Wiccan circles, the stang is replaced by the athame (black handled knife) and the cauldron replaced with the chalice but its^([sic]) pretty much /whatever works for you/.2009 June 22, Yowie, “Sikh Quaker?”, in soc.religion.quaker
  2. (archaic, obsolete) A long bar; a pole; a shaft; a stake.
    • Gripping the stang, she peered / At ghostly trees. Bus stopped. Bus disappeared.1962, Vladimir Nabokov, Pale Fire
  3. (historical, obsolete) In land measure, a pole, rod, or perch.
    • These fields were intermingled with woods of half a stang,*... (with the corresponding footnote: "An old word for a perch, sixteen feet and a half. These small woods were therefore eight feet and a quarter.")1880, Jonathan Swift, Gulliver's Travels into several Remote Nations of the World - Part I, Chapter II (page 15)

Verb

stang (third-person singular simple present stangs, present participle stanging, simple past and past participle stanged)

  1. (Scotland, intransitive) To shoot with pain, to sting.
  2. (Scotland, transitive) To spear; to sting.

Proper noun capitalized: Stang

Stang (plural Stangs)

  1. A surname.
  2. (US, slang) Ford Mustang

Also used as

stang is also the simple past of sting.

stang is also the clipping of Mustang.

Forms of stang

Noun
pluralstangs
Verb
third-person singular presentstangs
present participlestanging
past participlestanged
paststanged
Proper noun
pluralStangs
alternative formStong

Origin of stang

Inherited from Middle English stang, stong, from Old Norse stǫng, from Proto-Germanic *stangiz, *stangō (“bar, rod”), from Proto-Indo-European *stengʰ-, *stegʰ- (“to stick, sting, prick, be stiff”).

Inherited from Middle English stangen, from Old Norse stanga (“prick, goad”).

From the German and Jewish surname, from the noun Stange (“pole”).

Words formed from stang

Phrases with stang

Words that rhyme with stang

38 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about stang

What does stang mean?
Stang means a forked ritual staff.
What part of speech is stang?
Stang can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce stang?
Stang is pronounced /ˈstæŋ/ (UK).
What is the plural of stang?
The plural of stang is stangs.

Words near stang in the dictionary

  1. Stanford-Binets
  2. Stanford-le-Hope
  3. Stanfordville
  4. Stanforth
  5. Stanforths
  6. stang
  7. stang ball
  8. stang balls
  9. Stang's law
  10. Stange
  11. stanged

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: stang (page history and authors); Stang (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-stang.wav.

Cite this entry: “stang.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/stang. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.