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stump


noun one of the tall wooden supports by which a highset building is elevated above the ground.

Editor's comments: Note that this definition was formerly (and erroneously) under the entry "block".

Contributor's comments: We always referred to "stumps" rather than "blocks" or "poles" for high-set houses or "Queenslanders"

Contributor's comments: I have lived and travelled widely throughout Qld and NO-ONE and I mean NO-ONE refers to the pilons that support the "Old Queenslander" as anything else but Stumps. The invading toffs from down south might call a house "High Blocked" but we all know it is a Queenslander and it is firmly sitting on "HARDWOOD STUMPS".

Contributor's comments: The previous contributor's comments are incorrect. The expression 'high blocked house' is as common as dirt all over Queensland and to use the word block for the stumps is logical. Block also refers to the land on which the house (or no house) sits. Me block a land is exactly what it says - my patch of turf so 'no tresspassing'.

Contributor's comments: Houses were all either 'high blocked' or 'low blocked'. The latter included modern slab houses and low stumped houses. The former were reserved for houses at least 5 feet off the ground, giving you a reasonable chance of having some sort of life under the main floor.

Contributor's comments: I was born and lived in Queensland for 28 years. We used the term 'blocks' as in "The house is on blocks" to mean that the house had been raised on to temporary wooden blocks prior to being moved (analagous usage to "putting the car on blocks", i.e. using timber blocks to raise a car above ground for storage with its wheels removed). A house on stilts was usually referred to as being built on stumps. Sometimes people "battened in" the stumps to create a secure, airy extra space under the house.

Contributor's comments: We called them 'high-blocked' houses in Rockhampton but referred to the actual stilts as 'stumps'.

Contributor's comments: I'm a born and bred Qld'er and I even studied architecture for a few years after leaving school. I have NEVER heard of "stumps" being called "blocks".

Contributor's comments: In Rockhampton, a house was 'high-blocked' or 'low-blocked' or 'flat on the ground' as I recall. It could be 'built-in under' or just 'battened' but all houses on stilts were on 'stumps', not blocks, although they were all built on a 'block a dirt'. Of course, more modern houses were often built of blocks or sat on stumps made of blocks. In Rocky, such concrete blocks or bricks were known as 'rock-block' (eg a 'rock-block' house), but in Brisbane it was Besser-block!

Contributor's comments: I have lived in Brisbane for 27 years and have never heard of houses being on 'blocks'. Blocks are a different thing altogether, but houses have always been on stumps.

Contributor's comments: Transportable or 'fibro' homes were always put onto hardwood (usually Jarrah) stumps.

Contributor's comments: Stumps - used commonly in Western Qld, "high blocks" was also common 1960s-70s - can't say I've heard either terms much in cairns area. Our new timber floored house has pylons made from concrete and steel.