JOIST
What does "JOIST" mean?
A horizontal beam that supports a floor or ceiling.
Meanings
- One of a series of parallel beams laid edgewise to carry a floor or ceiling. The builders ran fresh joists across the room before laying the new floorboards. technical
Did you know?
- 'Joist' and 'gist' are cousins: both come from the Latin 'jacere', to lie down - a joist is literally the beam a floor lies on, and the 'gist' is what an argument rests on.
Word origin
From Old French 'giste' ('a beam supporting a floor', literally 'place to lie'), from Vulgar Latin 'jacita', from Latin 'jacere' ('to lie down') - a joist is what the floor 'lies' upon.
Remember it
JOIST holds up your floor - hear 'hoist' inside it, the beam that hoists the boards above the void.
A little poem
Unseen beneath the floor you trust each day,
a line of patient joists holds void at bay.
couplet
Wordplay
- The carpenter's pun about floor beams really held the room up - I just couldn't get the joist of it.
What it teaches
The things that carry your weight are usually the ones you never look at; respect the hidden supports.
Quick facts
What does JOIST mean?
A horizontal beam that supports a floor or ceiling.
Is JOIST a valid word?
Yes — JOIST is one of the answer words in Wordul, the daily word game.
How many letters is JOIST?
JOIST has 5 letters and 1 syllable.
Where does JOIST come from?
From Old French 'giste' ('a beam supporting a floor', literally 'place to lie'), from Vulgar Latin 'jacita', from Latin 'jacere' ('to lie down') - a joist is what the floor 'lies' upon.
What can JOIST teach us?
The things that carry your weight are usually the ones you never look at; respect the hidden supports.
How players do
Be the first to solve it.