What does "stope" mean?

A mining excavation in the form of a terrace of steps.

What is a synonym for "stope"?

Common synonyms include: footfall, footprint, footstep, gradation, measure, pace.

Stope

/[stoʊp]/ noun, verb

noun, verb ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1
A mining excavation in the form of a terrace of steps.
"The other smell […] that worked its way into your clothes, your skin, your spirit, believed here to rise by way of long-deserted drifts and stopes, from the everyday atmosphere of Hell itself."

Verb

1
To excavate in the form of stopes.
2
simple past of step form-of, obsolete, past
3
To fill in with rubbish, as a space from which the ore has been worked out.

Synonyms

All synonyms

footfall footprint footstep gradation measure pace

Example

More examples

"The other smell […] that worked its way into your clothes, your skin, your spirit, believed here to rise by way of long-deserted drifts and stopes, from the everyday atmosphere of Hell itself."

Etymology

Apparently related to step, but with uncertain phonological development. Perhaps from a German Low German word like Stoop (“step”), from Middle Low German stōpe (“step”). More at stoop.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.