Jump To:

• plane table
  plane table

  noun

  a drawing board mounted on a tripod, used in the field, with an alidade, for surveying tracts of land.
• plane-table
  plane-table

  verb (used with or without object)

  to survey with a plane table.

plane table

¹ American  

Or plain table

noun

Surveying.

1. a drawing board mounted on a tripod, used in the field, with an alidade, for surveying tracts of land.

---

plane-table ² American  

[pleyn-tey-buhl] / ˈpleɪnˌteɪ bəl /

verb (used with or without object)

plane-tabled, plane-tabling

1. to survey with a plane table.

---

plane table British  

noun

1. a surveying instrument consisting of a drawing board mounted on adjustable legs, and used in the field for plotting measurements directly

---

verb

1. to survey (a plot of land) using a plane table

Etymology

Origin of plane table¹

First recorded in 1600–10

Origin of plane-table²

First recorded in 1870–75

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

plane table plane-table

Theodolite and plane table work are not suited to very cold climates.

From South with Scott by Edward Ratcliffe Garth Russell Evans, Baron Mountevans

The word is found in some older English Dictionaries, and in France and Italy is still applied to the traversing index of a plane table or of a sextant.

From The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 by Henry Yule

In order not to offend the sultan's prejudices too much, we determined to dissemble, and I decided not to wear my little camera, and Imam Sharif packed the plane-table out of sight.

From Southern Arabia by Theodore Bent

Work on the wireless masts went on apace, and the geologist was abroad with his plane-table every day.

From The Home of the Blizzard Being the Story of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, 1911-1914 by Sir Douglas Mawson

This he must regulate, either by one of the guns in his vicinity, or, better, by the aid of a bearing-plate, a species of plane-table which gives the angular bearing of the object.

From Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. 1866. Fourth edition. by United States. Navy Dept. Bureau of Ordnance

"Orienting a Map," said Hamilton, "as I have explained to you a thousand times, means setting your map or plane-table so that the north line lies north."

From The Keepers of the King's Peace by Edgar Wallace

Each morning he was away with his plane-table and squad of coolies long before our breakfast was served, seldom reaching camp before nightfall.

From Mount Everest the Reconnaissance, 1921 by Charles Kenneth Howard-Bury