billet
English
Pronunciation
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- Rhymes: -ɪlɪt
Etymology 1
From Middle English bylet, from Anglo-Norman billette (“list, schedule”), from bille + -ette, from Latin bulla (“document”).
Noun
billet (plural billets)
- A short informal letter.
- 1749, Henry Fielding, chapter XII, in The History of Tom Jones, a Foundling, volumes (please specify |volume=I to VI), London: A[ndrew] Millar, […], →OCLC, book VI:
- However, when his cool reflections returned, he plainly perceived that his case was neither mended nor altered by Sophia's billet […]
- A written order to quarter soldiers.
Translations
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Etymology 2
From Middle French billette (“schedule”), from bullette, diminutive form of bulle (“document”), from Medieval Latin bulla, hence cognate with etymology 1 above.
Noun
billet (plural billets)
- A place where a soldier is assigned to lodge.
- 1918, W. B. Maxwell, chapter 19, in The Mirror and the Lamp:
- Nothing was too small to receive attention, if a supervising eye could suggest improvements likely to conduce to the common welfare. Mr. Gordon Burnage, for instance, personally visited dust-bins and back premises, accompanied by a sort of village bailiff, going his round like a commanding officer doing billets.
- 1997, Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault, page 9 (Totem Books, Icon Books; →ISBN
- 17 June 1940: Prime Minister Pétain requests armistice. Germans use the Foucaults’ holiday home as officers’ billet. Foucault steals firewood for school from collaborationist militia. Foucault does well at school, but messes up his summer exams in 1940.
- An allocated space or berth in a boat or ship.
- 1898, Winston Churchill, chapter 10, in The Celebrity:
- The skipper Mr. Cooke had hired at Far Harbor was a God-fearing man with a luke warm interest in his new billet and employer, and had only been prevailed upon to take charge of the yacht after the offer of an emolument equal to half a year's sea pay of an ensign in the navy.
- (figurative) Berth; position.
- (Can we date this quote by Pall Mall Magazine and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- His shafts of satire fly straight to their billet, and there they rankle.
- (Can we date this quote by Pall Mall Magazine and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
Verb
billet (third-person singular simple present billets, present participle billeting or billetting, simple past and past participle billeted or billetted)
- (transitive, of a householder etc.) To lodge soldiers, or guests, usually by order.
- (Can we date this quote by Washington Irving and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- Billeted in so antiquated a mansion.
- 1965, Justine, Philosophy in the Bedroom, and other Writings:
- Destroy, with entire unpity, raze to the ground, those detestable houses where you billet the progeny of the libertinage of the poor, appalling cloacas, wherefrom there every day spews forth into society a swarm of new-made creatures […]
- (Can we date this quote by Washington Irving and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- (intransitive, of a soldier) To lodge, or be quartered, in a private house.
- (transitive) To direct, by a ticket or note, where to lodge.
Translations
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Etymology 3
From Old French billette, from bille (“log, tree trunk”), from Vulgar Latin *bilia, probably of Gaulish origin (compare Old Irish bile (“tree”)).
Noun
billet (plural billets)
- (metallurgy) A semi-finished length of metal.
- A short piece of wood, especially one used as firewood.
- (Can we date this quote by William Shakespeare and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- They shall beat out my brains with billets.
- (Can we date this quote by William Shakespeare and provide title, author’s full name, and other details?)
- (heraldry) A rectangle used as a charge on an escutcheon.
- (architecture) An ornament in Norman work, resembling a billet of wood, either square or round.
- (saddlery) A strap that enters a buckle.
- A loop that receives the end of a buckled strap.
- (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)
Translations
Etymology 4
Noun
billet (plural billets)
- Alternative form of billard (“coalfish”)
Anagrams
Danish
Etymology
Noun
billet c (singular definite billetten, plural indefinite billetter)
- ticket (admission to entertainment, pass for transportation)
Inflection
common gender |
Singular | Plural | ||
---|---|---|---|---|
indefinite | definite | indefinite | definite | |
nominative | billet | billetten | billetter | billetterne |
genitive | billets | billettens | billetters | billetternes |
French
Etymology
From Old French billette, from Latin bulla. See French boulette.
Pronunciation
Noun
billet m (plural billets)
Related terms
Descendants
Further reading
- “billet”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.
- English 2-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- Rhymes:English/ɪlɪt
- English terms derived from Middle English
- English terms derived from Anglo-Norman
- English terms derived from Latin
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- English terms with quotations
- English terms derived from Middle French
- English terms derived from Medieval Latin
- Requests for date/Pall Mall Magazine
- English verbs
- English transitive verbs
- Requests for date/Washington Irving
- English intransitive verbs
- English terms derived from Old French
- English terms derived from Vulgar Latin
- English terms derived from Gaulish
- en:Metallurgy
- Requests for date/William Shakespeare
- en:Heraldic charges
- en:Architecture
- Requests for quotations/Knight
- Danish terms derived from French
- Danish lemmas
- Danish nouns
- Danish common-gender nouns
- French terms derived from Old French
- French terms derived from Latin
- French 2-syllable words
- French terms with IPA pronunciation
- French terms with audio links
- French lemmas
- French nouns
- French countable nouns
- French masculine nouns
- fr:Money