billet

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   temporary lodging assigned to a soldier or another member of an organization

   The abandoned school served as a billet for the infantry company.

2. 2
   noun

   a job, post, or duty assignment, especially in a military organization

   After training, she received a billet at the regiment's headquarters.

3. 3
   noun

   a short thick piece of wood or metal, especially a partly processed metal bar intended for further rolling or shaping

   The mill reheated each steel billet before rolling it into a rail.

4. 4
   verb

   to assign or provide temporary lodging, especially for troops

   The army billeted the visiting soldiers in houses near the fort.

Simplified etymology

Billet entered late Middle English from Anglo-Norman French billette, a diminutive of bill, and originally meant a short written document. By the mid-17th century it could mean a written order requiring a householder to accommodate its bearer, usually a soldier; the word then shifted to the temporary lodging itself.

The military senses come from Anglo-French billette ("list, schedule"), a small written order directing a householder to lodge a soldier; the order's name passed to the lodging and later the assigned post. The wood-and-metal sense is a separate borrowing of Old French billette, the diminutive of bille ("log").

Topics

External links

• Google Images
• Cambridge Dictionary
• Wiktionary