tile
UK /taɪl/ · US /ˈtaɪ.əl/ noun, verb
- noun A regularly-shaped slab of clay or other material, affixed to cover or decorate a surface, as in a roof-tile, glazed tile, stove tile, carpet tile, etc.
- noun (computing) A rectangular graphic. “Each tile within the map consists of 256 × 256 pixels.”
- noun Any of various flat cuboid playing pieces used in certain games, such as dominoes, Scrabble, or mahjong.
- noun (dated, informal) A stiff hat.
- noun (Lego building) A Lego piece that is 1/3 the height of a brick, and is smooth without studs on top.
- verb (transitive) To cover with tiles. “The handyman tiled the kitchen.”
- verb (graphical user interface) To arrange in a regular pattern, with adjoining edges (applied to tile-like objects, graphics, windows in a computer interface).
- verb (computing theory) To optimize (a loop in program code) by means of the tiling technique.
- verb (Freemasonry) To seal a lodge against intrusions from unauthorised people.
- verb To protect from the intrusion of the uninitiated. “to tile a Masonic lodge”
Synonyms
Etymology
From Middle English tile, tyl, tigel, tiȝel, teȝele, from Old English tiġele, tieġle, tiġle (“tile, brick”), from Proto-West Germanic *tigulā (“tile, brick”), from Proto-Germanic *tigulǭ (“tile, brick”), from Latin tēgula, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)teg- (“to cover”). Doublet of tegula.
Cognate with Saterland Frisian Tichel (“tile”), Dutch tichel (“brick”), tegel (“tile”), German Ziegel (“brick, roof tile”), Luxembourgish Zill (“brick, tile”), Danish tegl (“brick”), Faroese tigul (“tile”), Icelandic tigl (“brick, tile”), Norwegian Nynorsk tegl (“brick, roof tile”), Swedish tegel (“brick, tile”), Asturian teya (“tile”), Catalan teula (“tile”), French tuile (“tile”), Galician telha, tella (“roof tile”), Italian tegola (“roof tile”), Mirandese teilha (“roof tile”), Portuguese telha (“roof tile”), Spanish teja (“roof tile”), Belarusian цэ́гла (céhla, “brick”), Czech cihla (“brick”), Polish cegła (“brick”), Serbo-Croatian cígla (“brick”), Ukrainian це́гла (céhla, “brick”), Finnish tiili (“brick, tile”).
See tiler (“doorkeeper at a Masonic lodge”).
Webster’s 1913
- verb To protect from the intrusion of the uninitiated; as, to tile a Masonic lodge.
- noun A plate, or thin piece, of baked clay, used for covering the roofs of buildings, for floors, for drains, and often for ornamental mantel works.
- noun (a) A small slab of marble or other material used for flooring.
- verb To cover with tiles; as, to tile a house.
Etymology [See 2d Tiler.]
Etymology [OE. tile, tigel, AS. tigel, tigol, fr. L. tegula, from tegere to cover. See Thatch, and cf. Tegular.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “tile”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details