different between vacancy vs billet

English

Etymology

From vac(ant) +? -ancy.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?ve?k?nsi/

Noun

vacancy (countable and uncountable, plural vacancies)

1. An unoccupied position or job.
2. An available room in a hotel; guest house, etc.
3. Empty space.
   • 1993, James Michie, trans. Ovid, The Art of Love, Book II:

     Sky was set above earth, land ringed with sea, / Chaos retired to its own vacancy [...].

4. Lack of intelligence or understanding.
5. (physics) A defect in a crystal caused by the absence of an atom in a lattice

Related terms

• vacant (adjective)
• vacate (verb)

Translations

English

Pronunciation

• (UK, General American) IPA^(key): /?b?l?t/
• Rhymes: -?l?t

Etymology 1

From Middle English bylet, from Anglo-Norman billette (“list, schedule”), from bille +? -ette, from Latin bulla (“document”).

Noun

billet (plural billets)

1. A short informal letter.
2. A written order to quarter soldiers.

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle French billette (“schedule”), from bullette, diminutive form of bulle (“document”), from Medieval Latin bulla, hence cognate with etymology 1 above.

Noun

billet (plural billets)

1. A place where a soldier is assigned to lodge.
   • 1997, Chris Horrocks, Introducing Foucault, page 9 (Totem Books, Icon Books; ?ISBN

     17 June 1940: Prime Minister Pétain requests armistice. Germans use the Foucaults’ holiday home as officers’ billet. Foucault steals firewood for school from collaborationist militia. Foucault does well at school, but messes up his summer exams in 1940.

2. An allocated space or berth in a boat or ship.
3. (figuratively) Berth; position.
   • 1897, Pall Mall Magazine

     His shafts of satire fly straight to their billet, and there they rankle.

Verb

billet (third-person singular simple present billets, present participle billeting or billetting, simple past and past participle billeted or billetted)

1. (transitive, of a householder etc.) To lodge soldiers, or guests, usually by order.

   • Billeted in so antiquated a mansion.
2. (intransitive, of a soldier) To lodge, or be quartered, in a private house.
3. (transitive) To direct, by a ticket or note, where to lodge.

Translations

Etymology 3

From Middle English billet, bylet, belet, billette, from Old French billette, from bille (“log, tree trunk”), from Vulgar Latin *bilia, probably of Gaulish origin (compare Old Irish bile (“tree”)).

Noun

billet (plural billets)

1. (metallurgy) A semi-finished length of metal.
2. A short piece of wood, especially one used as firewood.
3. A short cutting of sugar cane produced by a harvester or used for planting.
4. (heraldry) A rectangle used as a charge on an escutcheon.
5. (architecture) An ornament in Norman work, resembling a billet of wood, either square or round.
6. (saddlery) A strap that enters a buckle.
7. A loop that receives the end of a buckled strap.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Knight to this entry?)

Translations

Etymology 4

Noun

billet (plural billets)

1. Alternative form of billard (“coalfish”)

Anagrams

• LIBlet, Litbel

Danish

Etymology

From French billet.

Noun

billet c (singular definite billetten, plural indefinite billetter)

1. ticket (admission to entertainment, pass for transportation)

Inflection

Further reading

• “billet” in Den Danske Ordbog

French

Etymology

From Old French billette, from Latin bulla. See French boulette.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /bi.j?/

Noun

billet m (plural billets)

1. ticket
2. note, a brief message
3. (short for billet de banque) banknote

Derived terms

• distributeur de billets

Related terms

• billet de banque (bank note)
• billet-doux
• billette
• billetterie
• billetiste

Descendants

Further reading

• “billet” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).