Source : Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)

Stickle \Stic"kle\, n. [Cf. {stick}, v. t. & i.]
   A shallow rapid in a river; also, the current below a
   waterfall. [Obs. or Prov. Eng.]

         Patient anglers, standing all the day Near to some
         shallow stickle or deep bay.             --W. Browne.

Stickle \Stic"kle\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. {Stickled}; p. pr. & vb.
   n. {Stickling}.] [Probably fr. OE. stightlen, sti?tlen, to
   dispose, arrange, govern, freq. of stihten, AS. stihtan: cf.
   G. stiften to found, to establish.]
   1. To separate combatants by intervening. [Obs.]

            When he [the angel] sees half of the Christians
            killed, and the rest in a fair way of being routed,
            he stickles betwixt the remainder of God's host and
            the race of fiends.                   --Dryden.

   2. To contend, contest, or altercate, esp. in a pertinacious
      manner on insufficient grounds.

            Fortune, as she 's wont, turned fickle, And for the
            foe began to stickle.                 --Hudibras.

            While for paltry punk they roar and stickle.
                                                  --Dryden.

            The obstinacy with which he stickles for the wrong.
                                                  --Hazlitt.

   3. To play fast and loose; to pass from one side to the
      other; to trim.

Stickle \Stic"kle\, v. t.
   1. To separate, as combatants; hence, to quiet, to appease,
      as disputants. [Obs.]

            Which [question] violently they pursue, Nor stickled
            would they be.                        --Drayton.

   2. To intervene in; to stop, or put an end to, by
      intervening; hence, to arbitrate. [Obs.]

            They ran to him, and, pulling him back by force,
            stickled that unnatural fray.         --Sir P.
                                                  Sidney.

Source : WordNet®

stickle
     v : dispute or argue stubbornly (especially minor points)