stool

Concise Oxford English Dictionary © 2008 Oxford University Press:
stool/stuːl/

▶noun

• 1 a seat without a back or arms, typically resting on three or four legs or on a single pedestal.

• 2 chiefly Medicine a piece of faeces.

• 3 a root or stump of a tree or plant from which shoots spring.

• 4 US a decoy bird in hunting.

▶verb throw up shoots from the root.

■ cut back (a plant) to or near ground level to induce new growth.

– phrases
fall between two stools Brit. fail to be or take either of two satisfactory alternatives.

– origin OE, of Gmc origin; rel. to stand.