tablet

English

Tablets (sense 3)

Etymology

From Middle English tablet, from Old French tablete (Modern French tablette), diminutive of table (“table”). Compare English table, -et.

Pronunciation

• enPR: tăbʹlĭt
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈtæblɪt/
• (Standard Southern British) IPA^(key): /ˈtablət/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (General American, Australia) IPA^(key): /ˈtæblət/

  • Audio (General American):

    (file)

• (New Zealand) IPA^(key): /ˈtɛblət/
• Rhymes: -æblɪt, -æblət

Noun

tablet (plural tablets)

1. A slab of clay, stone or wood used for inscription.
   • 2023 January 11, Stephen Roberts, “Bradshaw's Britain: castles and cathedrals”, in RAIL, number 974, page 56:

     Also mentioned is the Rev. T. Stock, who has a tablet in St John's church [Gloucester] and "who with Raikes established the four original Sunday schools in this parish ... in 1780. From this small beginning sprung that gratuitous system of Christian instruction which has covered the face of England and Wales with schools."

2. (religion) A short scripture written by the founders of the Baháʼí Faith.
4. A pill; a small, easily swallowed portion of a substance in solid form.

   Coordinate term: capsule

   Many people take vitamin tablets as a food supplement.

5. A block of several sheets of blank paper that are bound together at the top; pad of paper.
   • 2005, Kenneth T. Henson, Writing for Publication: Road to Academic Advancement, →ISBN, page 80:

     Take a full-size writing tablet and follow these steps.

6. (computing) A graphics tablet.
7. (computing) A tablet computer, a type of portable computer.
8. (Scotland) A confection made from sugar, condensed milk and butter, produced in flat slabs, with a grainer texture than fudge.
9. (rail transport) A type of round token giving authority for a train to proceed over a single-track line.
   • 1939 November, “Overseas Railways: Locomotive Performance in New Zealand”, in Railway Magazine, page 351:

     The latter's loss of time between Manakau and Levin was due to the mishap of dropping the tablet at Ohau, which entailed an out-of-course stop of 3 min. to recover it.

Derived terms

• carbon tablet
• clay tablet
• curse tablet
• disclosing tablet
• effervescent tablet
• laplet
• minitablet
• orally disintegrating tablet
• phablet
• sleeping tablet
• spirit tablet
• supertablet
• tab (drug)
• tabletary
• tabletless
• tabletlike
• tablet PC
• tabloid
• tabsule
• wax tablet

Descendants

• → Scottish Gaelic: tablaid

Translations

slab of clay

• Afrikaans: kleitablet
• Akkadian: 𒁾 (ṭuppu)
• Arabic: لَوْح m (lawḥ)
• Bulgarian: плочка (bg) f (pločka), табелка (bg) f (tabelka)
• Catalan: tauleta (ca) f
• Dutch: kleitablet (nl) f
• Finnish: savitaulu
• Ge'ez: ጾላዕ (ṣolaʿ)
• German: Tafel (de) f
• Greek: πινακίδα (el) f (pinakída), πλακίδιο (el) n (plakídio)

  Ancient Greek: πίναξ m (pínax), δέλτος f (déltos)

• Hebrew: לוּחַ (he) m (lúakh)
• Hungarian: írótábla, agyagtábla (hu), tábla (hu), kőtábla (hu)
• Latin: tabula f
• Persian: لوح (fa) (lovh)

  Old Persian: 𐎮𐎡𐎱𐎡 (di-i-p-i)

• Portuguese: tabuleta f
• Russian: доще́чка (ru) f (doščéčka), табли́чка (ru) f (tablíčka) (с надписью), плита́ (ru) f (plitá)
• Sogdian: 𐫤𐫀𐫢 (tʾš)
• Spanish: placa (es) f
• Sumerian: 𒁾 (DUB)
• Swedish: stentavla c
• Tagalog: tableta
• Turkish: levha (tr)

  Ottoman Turkish: تخته (tahta), لوحه (levha)

• Vietnamese: phiến (vi)

pill — see pill

graphics tablet — see graphics tablet

tablet computer — see tablet computer

(Scotland) type of confection

• Scottish Gaelic: tablaid f

See also

• caplet
• capsule

Verb

tablet (third-person singular simple present tablets, present participle tableting or (uncommon) tabletting, simple past and past participle tableted or (uncommon) tabletted)

1. (transitive) To form (a drug, etc.) into tablets.

References

• “tablet”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.

Anagrams

• Battle, batlet, battel, battle

Dutch

Etymology 1

Borrowed from Middle French tablette.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /taːˈblɛt/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ta‧blet
• Rhymes: -ɛt

Noun

tablet f or n (plural tabletten, diminutive tabletje n)

1. tablet, pill (piece of medicine in solid state)
2. flat, rectangular piece or slab

Derived terms

• bruistablet
• kleitablet
• vaatwastablet
• zuigtablet

Descendants

• → Indonesian: tablet

Etymology 2

Borrowed from English tablet.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtɛ.blət/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: ta‧blet

Noun

tablet m (plural tablets, no diminutive)

1. tablet computer

Indonesian

Etymology

From Dutch tablet, from Middle French tablette, from Old French tablete (Modern French tablette), diminutive of table (“table”), from Latin tabula. Doublet of tabel.

• Semantic loan from English tablet for tablet computer sense.

Pronunciation

• (Standard Indonesian) IPA^(key): /ˈtablɛt/ [ˈt̪ap̚.lɛt̪̚]
• Rhymes: -ablɛt
• Syllabification: tab‧let

Noun

tablèt (plural tablet-tablet)

1. tablet:
   1. (medicine, pharmacy) a pill; a small, easily swallowed portion of a substance

      Synonyms: gentel, pil

   2. a slab of clay used for inscription
   3. (computing) a tablet computer, a type of portable computer
2. flat, rectangular piece or slab

Derived terms

• tablet bukal
• tablet cetak
• tablet eferfesen
• tablet isap
• tablet kempa
• tablet kunyah
• tablet mandi
• tablet sublingual
• tablet uji air
• tablet vaginal

Further reading

• “tablet”, in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia [Great Dictionary of the Indonesian Language] (in Indonesian), Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016

Italian

Etymology

Borrowed from English tablet.

Pronunciation

• Audio:

  (file)

Noun

tablet m (invariable)

1. (computing) tablet computer

Middle English

Alternative forms

• tabelett, tabelet, tabblet, tabulet, tabulette

Etymology

From Old French tablete; equivalent to table +‎ -et.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtab(ə)lɛt(ə)/, /ˈtaːb(ə)lɛt(ə)/

Noun

tablet (plural tablettes)

1. A tablet, especially an easily carried one for writing on.
2. (biblical) The Ten Commandments in physical form handed down from heaven.
3. A level surface for painting or working upon.
4. A piece of jewellery with a level portion.
5. (rare) A marble slab utilised as tiling.
6. (rare) A pill; a tablet for medication.

Descendants

• English: tablet
• Scots: taiblet

References

• “tablet, n.”, in MED Online, Ann Arbor, Mich.: University of Michigan, 2007, retrieved 27 June 2018.

Polish

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Italic *taðlā

Latin tabula

Old French table

Proto-Indo-European *-tós

Proto-Italic *-tosder.?

Latin -ittus

Old French -ete

Old French tabletebor.

Middle English tablet

English tabletbor.

Polish tablet

Borrowed from English tablet, from Middle English tablet, borrowed from Old French tablete. By surface analysis, table + -et.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈta.blɛt/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ablɛt
• Syllabification: ta‧blet

Noun

tablet m inan

1. (computing) digitizer, graphics tablet (small, easily swallowed portion of a substance)
2. (computing) tablet computer

Declension

Declension of tablet

	singular	plural
nominative	tablet	tablety
genitive	tableta, tabletu	tabletów
dative	tabletowi	tabletom
accusative	tablet	tablety
instrumental	tabletem	tabletami
locative	tablecie	tabletach
vocative	tablecie	tablety

Further reading

• “tablet”, in Wielki słownik języka polskiego‎^[1] (in Polish), Instytut Języka Polskiego PAN
• “tablet”, in Polish dictionaries at PWN‎^[2] (in Polish)

Portuguese

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Italic *taðlā

Latin tabula

Old French table

Proto-Indo-European *-tós

Proto-Italic *-tosder.?

Latin -ittus

Old French -ete

Old French tabletebor.

Middle English tablet

English tabletubor.

Portuguese tablet

Unadapted borrowing from English tablet.

Pronunciation

• (Brazil) IPA^(key): /ˈta.ble.t͡ʃi/, /ˈta.blet͡ʃ/

 

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /ˈta.blɨt/ [ˈta.βlɨt]

• (Portugal) IPA^(key): /ˈta.blɨt/ [ˈta.βlɨt]
  • (Southern Portugal) IPA^(key): /ˈta.blɨt/

Noun

tablet m (plural tablets)

1. (computing) tablet computer (a type of portable computer)

   Synonym: táblete

Further reading

• “tablet”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2026

Spanish

Etymology

Etymology tree

Proto-Italic *taðlā

Latin tabula

Old French table

Proto-Indo-European *-tós

Proto-Italic *-tosder.?

Latin -ittus

Old French -ete

Old French tabletebor.

Middle English tablet

English tabletubor.

Spanish tablet

Unadapted borrowing from English tablet.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈtablet/ [ˈt̪a.β̞let̪]
• Rhymes: -ablet
• Syllabification: ta‧blet

Noun

tablet m or f same meaning (plural tablets)

1. (computing) tablet

   Synonym: tableta

Usage notes

According to Royal Spanish Academy (RAE) prescriptions, unadapted foreign words should be written in italics in a text printed in roman type, and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available. In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.

Further reading

• Seco, Manuel; Andrés, Olimpia; Ramos, Gabino (2023), “tablet”, in Diccionario del español actual [Dictionary of Current Spanish] (in Spanish), third digital edition, Fundación BBVA