entry
stymie
/ˈstaɪmi/An obstacle that blocks progress
From Middle English stime (a trace).
Word Ancestry
Golf gave this word its stage, but not its whole costume. In the old game, a stymie was that maddening little moment when your opponent’s ball sat between you and the cup, like a pebble placed exactly where your boot wants to land. The first attested noun shows up in 1834, and by 1857 golfers were already using it as a verb; the wider sense of “block, hinder, thwart” followed in the early 1900s. The origin is murky, which is deliciously fitting: it may come from a Scots word for poor eyesight, or from a word meaning “a tiny glimmer” or “the least bit,” a cousin of little-notice words like stime and styme. Either way, the image is perfect — one tiny object, one tiny failure of vision, and suddenly your plan is dead in the grass.
The Story
Golf gave this word its stage, but not its whole costume. In the old game, a stymie was that maddening little moment when your opponent’s ball sat between you and the cup, like a pebble placed exactly where your boot wants to land. The first attested noun shows up in 1834, and by 1857 golfers were already using it as a verb; the wider sense of “block, hinder, thwart” followed in the early 1900s. The origin is murky, which is deliciously fitting: it may come from a Scots word for poor eyesight, or from a word meaning “a tiny glimmer” or “the least bit,” a cousin of little-notice words like stime and styme. Either way, the image is perfect — one tiny object, one tiny failure of vision, and suddenly your plan is dead in the grass.
Kin & Kindred
From 'stime'·a trace; a whit; the least thing
Derived Terms
English words from this root
Sources
Etymonline
Free Dictionary
Urban Dictionary
Wikipedia
Wiktionary