Stem /(?)/

1. To gleam. [Obs.]

   His head bald, that shone as any glass, . . . [And] stemed as a furnace of a leed [caldron].

1. A gleam of light; flame. [Obs.]

1. The principal body of a tree, shrub, or plant, of any kind; the main stock; the part which supports the branches or the head or top.

   After they are shot up thirty feet in length, they spread a very large top, having no bough nor twig in the trunk or the stem.

   The lowering spring, with lavish rain, Beats down the slender stem and breaded grain.

2. A little branch which connects a fruit, flower, or leaf with a main branch; a peduncle, pedicel, or petiole; as, the stem of an apple or a cherry.
3. The stock of a family; a race or generation of progenitors.

   While I do pray, learn here thy stem And true descent.

4. A branch of a family.

   This is a stem Of that victorious stock.

5. A curved piece of timber to which the two sides of a ship are united at the fore end. The lower end of it is scarfed to the keel, and the bowsprit rests upon its upper end. Hence, the forward part of a vessel; the bow. (Naut.)
6. Fig.: An advanced or leading position; the lookout.

   Wolsey sat at the stem more than twenty years.

7. Anything resembling a stem or stalk; as, the stem of a tobacco pipe; the stem of a watch case, or that part to which the ring, by which it is suspended, is attached.
8. That part of a plant which bears leaves, or rudiments of leaves, whether rising above ground or wholly subterranean. (Bot.)
9. The entire central axis of a feather. (Zool.)
10. The short perpendicular line added to the body of a note; the tail of a crotchet, quaver, semiquaver, etc. (Mus.)
11. The part of an inflected word which remains unchanged (except by euphonic variations) throughout a given inflection; theme; base. (Gram.)

1. To remove the stem or stems from; as, to stem cherries; to remove the stem and its appendages (ribs and veins) from; as, to stem tobacco leaves.
2. To ram, as clay, into a blasting hole.

imp. & p. p. Stemmed; p. pr. & vb. n. Stemming

1. To oppose or cut with, or as with, the stem of a vessel; to resist, or make progress against; to stop or check the flow of, as a current.

   [They] stem the flood with their erected breasts.

   Stemmed the wild torrent of a barbarous age.

1. To move forward against an obstacle, as a vessel against a current.

   Stemming nightly toward the pole.