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Glite Dictionary
to come down in stair rods

to come down in stair rods

9.9
To rain very heavily
  • idiom
  • Archaic
translation icon : llover a cántaros
  • The weather was fine all morning, then it began to come down in stair rods in the afternoon.

Examples

  • It started to come down in stair rods just as the match began.

  • If it comes down in stair rods tomorrow, we might have to postpone the wedding.

  • It started to come down in stair rods during the night.

  • Did it really come down in stair rods last night?

  • If it comes down in stair rods tomorrow, we might have to postpone the wedding.

  • It started to come down in stair rods just as the match began.

  • The weather was fine all morning, then it began to come down in stair rods in the afternoon.

Synonyms

to pelt
vsto come down in stair rods
8 5.5

To fall very hard, usually about rain

shows intense rainfall but focuses on overall heaviness not blows
to beat down
vsto come down in stair rods
4 3.9

To shine or fall very strongly on a place

is limited to rain and focuses solely on heavy falling rather than shining
to rain cats and dogs
vsto come down in stair rods
  • Informal
3 5.9

To rain very hard

expresses the same intense rain but in plain nonidiomatic language
to bucket down
vsto come down in stair rods
  • UK
1 6.5

To rain very hard

describes the same heavy rain but not using a vivid image
to rain buckets
vsto come down in stair rods
  • Informal
1 5.6

To pour a lot of water from the sky

refers to intense rain too but more about force than volume
to come down heavily
vsto come down in stair rods
3.4

Rain that falls very hard

focuses on continuous intense rainfall rather than sharp individual impacts
to raining pitchforks
vsto come down in stair rods
  • Informal
8.9

To rain very heavily with water falling fast and hard

means intense rainfall too but not with violent imagery

Antonyms

to drizzle
7 1.0

To rain very lightly with small drops falling slowly

How Heavy

to come down in stair rods
  • Archaic
9.9
to rain
541 1.0
shower
162 1.0
to drizzle
7 1.0

Surface Forms

come down in stair rods infinitive
came down in stair rods past
come down in stair rods past participle
coming down in stair rods present participle
comes down in stair rods third person singular

Morphology

come + down + in + stair + rod

While 'come down' transparently suggests something falling, the sequence 'in stair rods' is not compositionally interpretable as heavy rain—'stair' + 'rod' does not naturally evoke precipitation. This is an idiomatic, somewhat archaic expression whose overall meaning ('to rain very heavily') cannot be derived from the constituent words, so a B1 learner who knows the words would likely not predict the idiomatic sense.

Etymology

The idiom come down in stair rods comes from a simple picture: one popular story says very heavy rain looked like long, straight metal bars falling from the sky, like the brass stair rods that hold carpets on stairs. So, the phrase means 'to rain very heavily'.