Table-cloth

(for pl. see CLOTH sb.). A cloth for covering a table.

  a.  A white cloth, usually of linen, spread upon a table in preparation for a meal, and upon which the dishes, plates, etc., are placed.

1467.  Mann. & Househ. Exp. (Roxb.), 409. My mastyr paid there for a tabylle clothe ij. s. vj. d.

1496–7.  Rec. St. Mary at Hill, 34. Item, ij dyapre Tableclothis for the high Auter.

1575.  in Willis & Clark, Cambridge (1886), III. 363. If either fellowe or pensioner do wipe his hande or finger of the table clothe he shall pay for every time j^d.

1586.  B. Young, Guazzo’s Civ. Conv., IV. 185. Y^e table clothes wer spread.

1610.  Holland, Camden’s Brit. (1637), 481. Table clothes and linnen used at the solemne Coronation.

1855.  Mrs. Gaskell, North & S., xxvi. Clothes-basket[s] … full of tablecloths and napkins.

1885.  Manch. Exam., 9 Sept., 3/1. Equal to the task of instructing a laundress in the ironing of a tablecloth.

  b.  A cloth, usually of woollen material and often of ornamental design, used to cover a table permanently or when not in use for meals; = table-cover (TABLE sb. 22).

1610.  in Eng. Wom. Dom. Mag. (1862), IV. 109. If the green table-cloth be too little I will make a pair of warm stockings of it.

1879.  Crockett, Kit Kennedy, xlix. 358. The letter was laid down on the tablecloth, with a fast-falling rain of tears falling upon it.

  c.  fig. Name for a cloud covering the flat top and hanging down over the edge of Table Mountain at the Cape of Good Hope.

[1791.  Encycl. Brit. (ed. 3), VIII. 16/2. The Table Land or Mountain is sometimes suddenly capped with a white cloud, by some called the ‘spreading of the Table-cloth.’]

1836.  Lett. fr. Madras (1843), 29. When the cloud that they call the Table-cloth comes down, people are often lost in the fog.

1898.  Westm. Gaz., 13 Oct., 1/3. I had no time to spare for the ascent of Table Mountain, and the tablecloth of clouds indeed forbade me to attempt it.

  Hence Table-clothing, linen for table-cloths; Table-cloth-wise adv., in the manner of a table-cloth; Table-clothy a., resembling or suggesting a table-cloth.

1859.  Geo. Eliot, A. Bede, xxxi. I’m having linen spun, an’ thinking all the while it’ll make sheeting and table-clothing for her when she’s married.

1891.  Kipling, Life’s Handicap, End of Passage, 159. Clouds of tawny dust … flung themselves tablecloth-wise among the tops of the parched trees, and came down again.

1866.  Howells, Venet. Life, iii. Where the marble is carven in vast and heavy folds … to simulate a curtain … it has … a harshness decidedly table-clothy.