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tablecloth

nounB2Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #8,556 of 15,258leans spoken

Other forms: tablecloths

A tablecloth is the big cloth spread over a table before a good dinner. Ironed, and removed before anybody spills anything on it.

It is one of the small markers of formality, since a restaurant with tablecloths is a certain kind of restaurant. Linen and cotton are traditional, and a wipe-clean one is for kitchens with children. Oilcloth was the practical Victorian answer. There is a famous party trick involving pulling one out from under a full setting, which relies on physics and almost never works at home.

The original uploader was Paulnasca at English Wikipedia. · CC BY 2.5

Definitions of tablecloth

  1. 1nountableclothA cloth spread over a table, especially for a meal.B2

    “She shook the crumbs off the tablecloth.”

    • Said"Put the good tablecloth on; my mother's coming."
    • WrittenThe tablecloths were white and starched and never once survived a winter feast without wine.
    • UsedIron the tablecloth while it is slightly damp for a flat finish.
    • ContrastA tablecloth, not a napkin. A napkin is small and yours; a tablecloth covers the whole table for everyone. napkin →
    • Not thisA plastic sheet under a child's chair is not a tablecloth. A tablecloth goes on top.
    • Exchange"Tablecloth?""Yes. Hide the scratches."
    • SimplyPut the tablecloth on the table. Then the plates.

    Patternlay / spread a tablecloth · a white / linen / plastic tablecloth · spill sth on the tablecloth

Remember it

TABLE-CLOTH → the CLOTH over the TABLE

Exactly what it says: the cloth spread over the table before the plates go down.

hooks ontotablecloth

Where it comes from

Tablecloth replaced bordcloth. Old English had bordclāþ, board-cloth, and when table arrived from French the first half was swapped out and the second left exactly where it was.

  1. Middle English

    tabyllcloth

  2. English, today

    tablecloth

Built from

  • bordcloth · Middle English — tablecloth

From Middle English tabyllcloth, table cloth, tabylle clothe, a partial translation of earlier Middle English bord cloth, bordcloth (“tablecloth”), from Old English bordclāþ, equivalent to table + cloth.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in In the Kitchen, A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 16 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

tablecloth in the wild

  • A tablecloth is a cloth used to cover a table.

    Tablecloth

  • Other tablecloths are designed to be spread on a dining table before laying out tableware and food.

    Tablecloth

  • A placemat or table mat is a covering or pad designating an individual place setting, unlike the larger tablecloth that covers the entire surface.

    Placemat

  • The term is a word of Persian origin meaning the tablecloth which is spread on the ground, floor, or table as a sanitary surface for food.

    Dastarkhān

  • A Longchamps in Washington D.C. was among the first tablecloth restaurants there to allow black customers.

    Longchamps (restaurant chain)

From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.