Carpentry. Also 9 style. [Of uncertain origin; perh. a. Du. stijl pillar, prop, door-post.] Each of the vertical bars of a wainscot, sash, panel door, or other wooden framing.
1678. Moxon, Mech. Exerc., v. 83. You must leave some stuff to pare away smooth to the struck line, that the Stile (that is, the upright Quarter) may make a close Joynt with the Rail (that is the lower Quarter).
1710. J. Harris, Lex. Techn., II. Stiles, the upright pieces which go from the bottom to the top in any Wainscot, are by the Workmen called Stiles.
1768–74. Tucker, Lt. Nat. (1834), I. 290. When we look upon the wainscot of a room, where the panels are painted of a different colour from the stiles and mouldings.
1801. Felton, Carriages (ed. 2), II. 43. Two crests on the door-stiles 8s.
1825. J. Nicholson, Operat. Mechanic, 326. His turning machine … the legs or stiles L, the puppets A, B, the cheeks o, o. Ibid., 593. The face of the pulley-stile of every sash-frame ought to project about three-eighths of an inch beyond the edge of the brick-work.
1825. Greenhouse Comp., I. 15. In the case of Grecian architecture, the mouldings of any of the orders are readily applied to the styles, rails and bars.
1844. Civil Engin. & Arch. Jrnl., VII. 114/2. In constructing the walls of houses, in the first instance, ‘stiles’ or pieces of timber are inserted at convenient distances.
1846. Holtzapffel, Turning, II. 715. In a rectangular frame … the tenons are commonly made on the shorter pieces, called the rails, and the mortises on the longer or the styles.
1869. Blackmore, Lorna D., xxxviii. Making spars to keep for thatching, wall-crooks to drive into the cob, stiles for close sheep-hurdles, and handles for rakes.
1881. Young, Ev. Man his own Mechanic, § 709. 323. Nor should nails be driven into the styles of any door.
1883. M. P. Bale, Saw-Mills, 336. Stiles, part of a window sash.
