[f. STANDING vbl. sb.]
1. A place prepared or assigned for a person or thing to stand in; a place to accommodate persons standing.
c. 1440. Promp. Parv., 477/1. Stondynge place, where men stondyn, stacio.
1561. Clough, in Burgon’s Life Gresham (1839), I. 378. In the makyng of pagents, and standyng plasys to stande uppon, to geve judgement, who shalle wyn the pryse.
1585. Higins, Junius’ Nomencl., 189/2. Cauea,… the court or low standing place before the stage, where the people stoode or sat togither. Ibid., 287/1. Statio,… the soldiours station or standing place, which they are appointed to keepe in the time of warre.
1869. ‘Mark Twain,’ Innoc. Abroad, xiii. (1881), 103. A speculator bridged a couple of barrels with a board and we hired standing-places on it.
fig. 1889. Spectator, 21 Sept., 365/1. If this portion of by no means the largest of the Republics of South America has so much spare room in it, there is no need to despair of people finding standing-places in the world.
2. A place where a person takes his stand.
1736. C. Wesley, Let. Lady Oglethorpe, in J. Telford, Methodist Hymn-bk. (1906), 429. The vastness of the watery waste, as compared with my standing-place, called to mind the briefness of human life and the immensity of its consequences.
1856. Stanley, Sinai & Pal., vii. (1858), 300. A high place dedicated to the heathen Nebo, as Balaam’s standing-place had been consecrated to Peor.
