pasteboard

Etymology

It is formed from English paste + board.^{[2][3][4][5][6]} The OED and the Shorter Oxford also compare the verb paste,^[2][7] and the OED compares the earlier pastry board for the cookery sense.^[2] According to Etymonline, the material was so called because it was first made from single sheets of paper pasted together.^[4]

Earliest recorded meaning

A board on which pastry or dough is rolled out: 1452, in a York will printed in Testamenta Eboracensia.^[2] The paper sense, a board made of sheets of paper pasted together, especially for the cover of a book, follows in 1511,^[2] which is Merriam-Webster's first date;^[3] Etymonline and Dictionary.com date the word to the 1540s.^[4][6]

Semantic evolution

The kitchen sense was rare before the 18th century and died out after 1894, though Merriam-Webster Unabridged still lists the dough board and the paperhanger's board, which the OED records from 1901.^[2][3] The material, made by pasting three or more sheets together and pressing them, is recorded from 1562, and the adjective "made of pasteboard" from Ben Jonson in 1601.^[2][3] Because pasteboard was thin and flimsy, the word came to stand for something unsubstantial (1648), and the adjective for "unreal, sham" (1659).^[2][3] Johnson (1755) described it as masses made by pasting one paper on another, or by casting macerated paper or pounded old cordage in moulds.^[5] In 19th-century slang a pasteboard was a visiting card, from 1837, in Theodore Hook, with to leave or lodge one's pasteboard for calling on someone and a verb to pasteboard a person;^[8][2] it was also an invitation (1853), a playing card (1840, chiefly American) and, in the United States, a railway ticket and later a ticket for a game (1856).^[8][2][3]

Timeline

• 1452 – a board for rolling out pastry (obsolete after 1894).^[2]
• 1511 – a board of sheets of paper pasted together, especially a book cover.^[2][3]
• 1562 – the stiff material made of pasted sheets.^[2]
• 1601 – adjective, made of pasteboard.^[2][3]
• 1648 – figuratively, something flimsy or unsubstantial.^[2]
• 1659 – adjective, unsubstantial, unreal.^[2]
• 1837 – slang, a visiting card.^[2][8]
• 1840 – a playing card, chiefly in the United States.^[2]
• 1853 – slang, an invitation card.^[8]
• 1856 – in the United States, a ticket.^[2]
• 1901 – a board on which wallpaper is cut and pasted.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. A stiff paperboard made by pasting together two or more sheets of paper; broadly, any fairly thin, stiff paperboard.^[3][2]
2. (dated slang) A visiting card.^[3][2][8]
3. (slang) A playing card.^[3][2][8]
4. (US) A ticket, formerly for a train, later for a game or show.^[3][2]
5. A board on which dough is rolled out.^[3][2]
6. A board on which a paperhanger lays out and pastes wallpaper.^[3][2]

Adjective

1. Made of pasteboard: a pasteboard crown.^[3][2]
2. Flimsy, sham or unsubstantial: a pasteboard hero.^[3][2]

Related words

• paste
• board
• pastry

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z 27 28 Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
4. ^ a b c Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
5. ^ a b Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
6. ^ a b Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
7. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c d e f Green, Jonathon (2010), Green's Dictionary of Slang, London: Chambers; digital ed. 2016–, https://greensdictofslang.com