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# stale

«stale» in Mova's school dictionary: **old, dry and not fresh any more** — its meaning for a pupil, its sense in the lessons and examples, with 3 sentences of Mova's corpora that use it.

### part of speech

adjective (stale, staler, stalest)

### meaning for a pupil

1) Stale food, especially bread or cake, is old, dry and not fresh any more. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#m1)

2) Stale air is old and stuffy, not fresh, like in a room with closed windows. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#m2)

3) Stale news or jokes are old and boring because people have heard them too many times. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#m3)

4) In hunting, a stale trail is an old scent that has grown weak and is hard to follow. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#m4)

### sense in the lessons

In everyday life, bread goes stale if it is left out; crisps go stale in an open bag. In science, bread goes stale because it loses water; fresh air helps us concentrate. Phrases: «go stale», «stale bread», «stale air».

### examples

- The bread went stale because we left the bag open. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x1)
- Let's open a window; the air in here is stale. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x2)
- We fed the stale crusts to the ducks. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x3)
- Seal the cereal box, or it will go stale. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x4)
- That joke is stale; everyone knows it. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x5)
- Stale biscuits are soft instead of crunchy. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x6)
- The room smelled stale after the holiday. [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x7)
- He shall follow the new trail, and the stale trail, and the mixed trail, with a clear eye! [tree →](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/#x8)

### note

Adjective: stale, staler, stalest. Stale is not the same as mouldy or rotten: stale food is old and dry but may still be safe; mouldy food is not safe to eat. Opposite: «fresh». Feeding lots of bread to ducks is not good for them.

### In the corpora

- [Walking sharks can survive for hours with very little oxygen when a rock pool gets warm and stale at low tide.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/311-sharks-by-kind-small-and-strange-walking-sharks-wobbegongs-cookiecutters-and-goblin-sharks/7/)
- [Bread goes stale as its starch slowly lines up and squeezes out water; warming it in the oven softens it for a while.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/chemistry/21-bread-rising-yeast-at-work/16/)
- [«Sure the cake was stale!» At a christening they end up singing together, crying, and it's over.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/474-feuds-between-families/17/)

### Trees and pragmatics

[Every meaning and example of «stale» parsed by Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/dictionaries/school/S/stale/), each sentence with its dependency tree and frames.