stumble
/ˈstʌmbəl/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Northern England/ˈstʊmbəl/
stumble noun: a fall, trip or substantial misstep.
Noun
stumble (plural stumbles)
- A fall, trip or substantial misstep.
- I went to his aid. As he said, a board in the floor was loose. His stepping on it unawares had caused his stumble.1897, Richard Marsh, The Beetle
- An error or blunder.
- Possibly Mr. Carrados was considering it from his own way round for he did not appear to notice anything in her stumble.1934, Ernest Bramah, The Bravo of London
- She owns up to early stumbles, such as bottles being mislabeled.2022 July 21, Emily Hell, “TikTok’s Pink Sauce chef defends her viral condiment”, in Washington Post
- A clumsy walk.
- From the ground, Colombo’s port does not look like much. Those entering it are greeted by wire fences, walls dating back to colonial times and security posts. For mariners leaving the port after lonely nights on the high seas, the delights of the B52 Night Club and Stallion Pub lie a stumble away.2013 June 8, “The new masters and commanders”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8839, page 52
Verb
stumble (third-person singular simple present stumbles, present participle stumbling, simple past and past participle stumbled)
- To misstep; to walk or run clumsily; to trip or fall.
- He stumbled over a rock.
- Last night, you drunkenly stumbled to the front door, waking up the whole house.
- To make mistakes, to have trouble.
- I always stumble over verbs in Spanish.
- […] they are out of the way through strong drinke, they erre in vision, they stumble in iudgement.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 28:7
- To cause to stumble or trip.
- Slowly, I turned around and the shock of it stumbled me back a few steps.2017, Jacqueline Druga, Sleepers, page 39
- Synonyms:
- trip up
- To mislead, to cause to err or fall.
- False and dazzling fires to stumble men.1644, John Milton, Areopagitica; a Speech of Mr. John Milton for the Liberty of Unlicenc’d Printing, to the Parlament of England, London: [s.n.], →OCLC
- One thing more stumbles me in the very foundation of this hypothesis.a. 1705, John Locke, “An Examination of P[ère] Malebranche’s Opinion of Seeing All Things in God”, in Posthumous Works of Mr. John Locke: […], London: […] A[wnsham] and J[ohn] Churchill, […]...
- Synonyms:
- confound
- To make a discovery unexpectedly or accidentally; to chance, come, or happen (upon a person or thing) (with onto, across, on, upon).
- We stumbled onto the answer without even trying.
- It ſeems more probable that Ovid vvas either the Confident of ſome other paſſion, or that he had ſtumbled by ſome inadvertency, upon the privacies of Livia, and ſeen her in a Bath: […]1680, John Dryden, “The Preface to Ovid’s Epistles”, in Ovid, Ovid’s Epistles, […], London: […] Jacob Tonson […], →OCLC
stumble meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu
stumble in Tamil
- இடறல், இடறு, தடுமாறு, தடுமாற்றம்
stumble in Urdu
- ٹھوکر, ٹھوکر کھانا
stumble in Bengali
- stumble, trip
- হোঁচট hõcoṭ
stumble in Telugu
- to trip or fall
- కాలుజారు kālujāru
More languagesFewer languages
- stumble in Malayalam
- കാലിടറുക, അറച്ചുപോവുക
- stumble in Kannada
- ಎಡವು, ಎಡಂಪು, ಎಡಪು, ಎಡಹು
- stumble in Punjabi
- ਲੁੜ੍ਹਕਣਾ luṛhkaṇā
- stumble in Gujarati
- લથડવું lathaḍvũ, લથડિયું lathḍiyũ
- stumble in Sanskrit
- विस्खलति viskhalati, स्खल् skhal, ह्वरति hvárati
- stumble in Arabic
- عَثْرَة ʕaṯra, تَلَعْثَمَ talaʕṯama, عَثَرَ ʕaṯara
- stumble in Persian
- سکندر sekandar, سکندری sekandari, سکرفیدن sekarfidan
Examples of stumble in a sentence
- I stumbled along through the young pines and huckleberry bushes.1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
- I try to say goodbye and I choke (yeah) / Try to walk away and I stumble / Though I try to hide it, it's clear / My world crumbles when you are not near1999, Macy Gray, “I Try”, in On How Life Is:
- Forth as she waddled in the brake, / A grey goose stumbled on a snake.1754, Christopher Smart, Snake:
Synonyms of stumble
Forms of stumble
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | stumbles |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | stumbles |
| present participle | stumbling |
| past participle | stumbled |
| past | stumbled |
Origin of stumble
Ultimately from Proto-Germanic *stam- (“to trip up; to stammer, stutter”), thereby related to German stumm (“mute”), Dutch stom (“dumb”). Doublet of stammer. Also related to verb in Dutch stommelen (“to walk silently”).
Words formed from stumble
Words that rhyme with stumble
Questions about stumble
- What does stumble mean?
- Stumble means a fall, trip or substantial misstep.
- What is stumble in Tamil?
- Stumble in Tamil is இடறல், இடறு, தடுமாறு. See Stumble meaning in Tamil.
- How do you use stumble in a sentence?
- I stumbled along through the young pines and huckleberry bushes.
- What part of speech is stumble?
- Stumble can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce stumble?
- Stumble is pronounced /ˈstʌmbəl/.
- What is the plural of stumble?
- The plural of stumble is stumbles.
Words near stumble in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: stumble (page history and authors); stumble (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); stumble (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); হোঁচট (Bengali) (page history and authors); stumble (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); stumble (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਲੁੜ੍ਹਕਣਾ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); લથડવું (Gujarati) (page history and authors); विस्खलति (Sanskrit) (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-stumble.ogg.
Cite this entry: “stumble.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/stumble. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.