Stallen

Part of speech: verb

Definitions

1. Archaic past participle meaning having been set into a fixed position, especially a stable stall or a seat of office
2. Describing something that has been put in a particular place or enclosure, such as an animal housed in a stable
3. Used in older English to mean installed or lodged in a designated stall, post, or official seat

Etymology: "Stallen" is the past participle of "stall" in its older sense of setting something in place, a meaning that has nearly vanished from modern English. Its ancestor is Old English "steall", meaning a standing place, a stable or a seat, which is also the source of "stall" in the sense of a stable compartment and of the "stalls" in a theatre. The verb developed from that noun, so to stall something once meant to put it in its place, much as a horse is put into a stall. Because the verb has largely dropped out of use, "stallen" now survives mostly in older writing and in dialect. Modern readers usually meet "stall" in its later senses, such as halting an engine or delaying a plan, which grew from the same idea of something coming to rest and staying put.