Stillness is quiet without any movement at all. The stillness of the room, a deep stillness, break the stillness.
It is more than silence because it includes the absence of motion, which is why it is used of early mornings, churches and snow. In photography, stillness in a long exposure is what keeps an image sharp. Note still, which as an adverb means even now and is the same word.
1nounstillnessQuiet without any movement at all.
“She loved the stillness of the forest early in the morning, before anyone else was awake.”
stillness is a state of quiet.
Old English stilnes is still plus -ness. The Old English still meant motionless or quiet.
Proto-Indo-European
*(s)telH-
Old English
stilnes — stillness, quiet; absence of noise or disturbance, release, relaxation; silence, abstention from speech; absence of disturbance or molestation, tranquility, peace, security; that which appeases
Middle English
stilnesse
English, today
stillness
From Middle English stilnesse, from Old English stilnes (“stillness, quiet; absence of noise or disturbance, release, relaxation; silence, abstention from speech; absence of disturbance or molestation, tranquility, peace, security; that which appeases”), equivalent to still + -ness.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA