trestle

Meanings

1. 1
   noun

   a frame with a horizontal bar supported by spreading legs, used alone or in pairs to hold a tabletop, planks, or another work surface

   The decorators laid the door across two trestles and used it as a temporary table.

2. 2
   noun

   a framework of braced supports carrying a bridge, railway, or elevated platform

   The train crossed a high wooden trestle above the ravine.

From Middle English trestel and Old French trestel, 'crossbeam or support,' ultimately from Latin transtellum, a diminutive of transtrum, 'crossbeam.' The portable support-frame sense extended to the repeated braced frames carrying a bridge.

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