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''stubble'' ▫ᴱᴺ｜Definition｜1st｜20260913123120-00-⌔

stubble - Wiktionary, the free dictionary

English

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Noun

stubble (usually uncountable, plural stubbles)

  • (countable and uncountable) Short, coarse hair, especially on a man’s face.
  • (literal, countable and uncountable) The short stalks left in a field after crops have been harvested.
    • ✤ Lord (ſayth he) Put them as a wheele and a ſtoble before the face of the wynde. For as the ſtoble, whyle the wynde bloweth wauereth and flyethe aboue in the ayre, nowe hygh nowe lowe, but anone as the wynde paſſeth it falleth adowne to the erthe and lyeth there ſtylle.1

Verb

stubble (third-person singular simple present stubbles, present participle stubbling, simple past and past participle stubbled)

  • (agriculture) To produce a crop in a field of stubble that remains after a preceding crop is removed, either by sowing a second crop or by allowing shoots to sprout from the roots of the stubble.
    • ✤ Here a system (if it may be called a system) of stubbling prevails — wheat succeeding wheat for a series of years, and without any material diminution of the yield.2
    • ✤ In 1919 the stubbled crop was heavier than either that fallowed or plowed.3
    • ✤ Both spring and fall ploughing produced a crop freer from weeds than where the seed was stubbled in.4
    • ✤ Because the biggest single expense in producing the crop is planting, good stubbling ability is prized.5

Etymology

From Middle English stuble, from Anglo-Norman stuble, estuble, from Old French estoble, esteule (whence Modern French éteule), from Latin stipula (“stalk, straw”). Cognate with Dutch stoppel, Central German Stoppel, Upper German Stupfel. Doublet of stipule.

Pronunciation

  • IPA: /ˈstʌb.əl/
  • Audio (US): 🔊
  • Rhymes: -ʌbəl

Printed 2026-09-13.

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Footnotes

  1. 1536 October 26 (date written; Gregorian calendar), “[The Eyght Commandement] Cap[ut] VII”, in Diues and Pauper, London: […] Tho[mas] Bertheleti […], published 1536, →OCLC, folio 313, recto: ↩

  2. 1851, United States. Department of Agriculture, Report of the Commissioner of Agriculture for the Year: 1850, page 371: ↩

  3. 1922, John Selden Cole, Alanson Lola Hallsted, Methods of Winter-wheat Production at the Fort Hays Branch Station, page 22: ↩

  4. 1922, Canada. Dept. of Agriculture. Research Station, Lacombe, Alta, Interim Report of the Superintendent, page 65: ↩

  5. 1983, W. H. Smith, Symposium on Potential Productivity of Field Crops Under Different Environments, page 377: ↩