Definition of "stir"

My minde is troubled, like a Fountaine stir'd, / And I my selfe see not the bottome of it.

1602, William Shakespeare, Troilus and Cressida‎, act III, scene 3

And in latin I speke wordes a fewe / To sauer with my predication / And for to stere men to devocion.And in Latin I speak a wordës few, / To saffron with my predicatión, / And for to stir men to devotión.

late 14th century, Chaucer, “The Pardoner’s prologue”, in The Canterbury Tales‎, (1561 edition), published 1868, page 214

An Ate, stirring him to bloud and strife […]

c. 1595, William Shakespeare, The Life and Death of King John‎, act I, scene 2

The Soldiers love her Brother’s Memory; / And for her sake some Mutiny will stir.

c. 1670, John Dryden, Tyrannick Love, or the Royal Martyr‎, III.1

Preserue the rights of thy place, but stirre not questions of Iurisdiction : and rather assume thy right in silence, and de facto, then voice it with claimes, and challenges.

1613, Francis Bacon, chapter 8, in The Essaies‎, London

They ſay he is the King of Perſea.But if he dare attempt to ſtir your ſiege,Twere requiſite he ſhould be ten times more,For all fleſh quakes at your magnificence.

c. 1587–1588, [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592; reprinted as Tamburlaine the Great (A Scolar Press Facsimile), Menston, Yorkshire, London: Scolar Press, 1973, Act III, scene i

[…] notwithstanding the swelling of my Foot, so that I had never yet in five days been able to stir it, but as it was lifted.

1677, Sir William Temple, “An Essay upon the Cure of Gout by Moxa”, in Miscellanea. The First Part, London, published 1705, page 209

And especially if they happen to have any superior character or possessions in this world, they fancy they have a right to talk freely upon everything that stirs or appears […]

1741, Isaac Watts, The Improvement of the Mind‎

I had not strength to stir or strive, / But felt that I was still alive— […]

1816, Byron, The Prisoner of Chillon‎

That night he was almost too happy to sleep, and so much love stirred in his little sawdust heart that it almost burst.

1922, Margery Williams, The Velveteen Rabbit

Though as I said it, glibly, reassuringly, I knew that I lied, and a little snake of guilt stirred and began to uncoil slightly, guilt and its constant companion deceit.

1993, Susan Hill, Mrs de Winter, published 1999, page 54

All are not fit with them to stir and toil.

1818, Byron, Childe Harold's Pilgrimage‎, canto III, stanza LXIX

Meanwhile, the friends of the unfortunate exile, far from resenting his unjust suspicions, were stirring anxiously in his behalf.

1850, Charles Merivale, A History of the Romans under the Empire‎, volume 1

“Mid-Lent, and the Enemy grins,” remarked Selwyn as he started for church with Nina and the children. Austin, knee-deep in a dozen Sunday supplements, refused to stir; poor little Eileen was now convalescent from grippe, but still unsteady on her legs; her maid had taken the grippe, and now moaned all day: “Mon dieu! Mon dieu! Che fais mourir!”

1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IV, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company

Why all these words, this clamour, and this stir?

1668, John Denham, Of Prudence (poem).

Consider, after so much stir about genus and species, how few words we have yet settled definitions of.

1693, [John Locke], “§107”, in Some Thoughts Concerning Education, London: […] A[wnsham] and J[ohn] Churchill, […]

When the long, hot journey drew to its end and the train slowed down for the last time, there was a stir in Jessamy’s carriage. People began to shake crumbs from their laps and tidy themselves up a little.

1967, Barbara Sleigh, Jessamy, Sevenoaks, Kent: Bloomsbury, published 1993, page 7

Being advertised of some stirs raised by his unnatural sons in England.

1612, Sir John Davies, Discoverie of the True Causes why Ireland was never entirely subdued

Sing Sing was a tough joint in those days, one of the five worst stirs in the United States.

1928, Jack Callahan, Man's Grim Justice: My Life Outside the Law, page 42

The Bat—they called him the Bat. […]. He'd never been in stir, the bulls had never mugged him, he didn't run with a mob, he played a lone hand, and fenced his stuff so that even the fence couldn't swear he knew his face.

1920, Mary Roberts Rinehart, Avery Hopwood, chapter I, in The Bat: A Novel from the Play (Dell Book; 241), New York, N.Y.: Dell Publishing Company, page 01