Other forms: placards
A placard is a stiff board with a message, carried in protest. Carry a placard, placards and banners, a hand-painted placard.
It is held up rather than pasted, which is what separates it from a poster in current use, though the French original was something stuck on a wall. The word is a relative of plaque.
1nounplacardA stiff board with a message, carried in protest.
“The protesters marched through the city holding placards that said Save Our Forests.”
placard is a sign.
Middle French placard means something pasted on a wall, from plaquier, to plaster or lay flat.
Proto-Germanic
*plaggą — a piece of cloth, patch
Middle Dutch
placken
Middle French
placard
Middle English
placard — official document
English, today
placard
Built from
From Middle English placard (“official document”), from Middle French placard, placart, plaquart (“a placard, a writing pasted on a wall”), from the Old French - verb plaquer, plaquier (“to stick or paste, roughcast”), from Middle Dutch placken, plecken (“to glue or fasten, plaster, patch”), ultimately from Proto-Germanic plaggą (“a piece of cloth, patch”), equivalent to plaque + ard. Related to Middle Low German placken (“to smear with lime or clay, plaster”), stq Plak, Plakke (“a hit, smack, slap”), German Placken (“a spot, patch”), Icelandic plagg (“a document”), Hebrew פלקט (“a large sheet of paper, typically with a photo or writing, posted on the wall”), English play. Compare also Modern Dutch plakkaat (“placard”), stq Plakoat (“a placard, poster”). More at play.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA