# tombstone
## English
### Alternative forms

* tomb-stone (archaic)

### Etymology

From tomb +‎ stone.

### Pronunciation

* (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ˈtuːmstəʊn/
* (General American) IPA: /ˈtuːmstoʊn/
* Audio (US):(file)

### Noun

tombstone (plural tombstones)
* A grave marker, a stone slab or similar object marking a person's grave.
    Synonyms: headstone, gravestone, grave marker
** 1922, Virginia Woolf, chapter 2, in Jacob's Room:True, there's no harm in crying for one's husband, and the tombstone, though plain, was a solid piece of work, and on summer's days when the widow brought her boys to stand there one felt kindly towards her.
* (mathematics) The symbol "∎" marking the end of a proof.
    Synonym: halmos
* (computing, Microsoft Windows) A marker that takes the place of deleted data, allowing for replication of the deletion across servers etc.
** 2008, Laura E. Hunter, Robbie Allen, Active Directory Cookbook, page 739:If you attempt to restore a backup that is older than the tombstone lifetime, it may introduce objects that were deleted […]
* (computing) A crashdump.
** 2014, Joshua J. Drake, Zach Lanier, Collin Mulliner, Android Hacker's Handbook, page 186:This actually results in a crash dump, which is written to the log and to a tombstone file.
* (cardiology) An unusual morphological feature on an electrocardiogram indicative of acute myocardial infarction, characterized by a massive ST elevation.
* (journalism) A printed advertisement in a newspaper or magazine, typically having unadorned centered text in black and white, enclosed in a simple box.
* (art) A museum plaque or caption displaying information about a work of art or exhibited object.
** 2015, Harvard Art Museum, Writing on the Wall:The last bit of information on each tombstone is an accession number—an alphanumeric block that is assigned when an object is added (accessioned) to the museums’ collections.
* (slang, archaic) A pawnbroker's ticket.
** 1862, W. H. Watts, My Private Note-Book; or, Recollections of an old reporter, page 123:" […] Pity we're not both same size, or I'd steal one of your shirts, for I buried the last of mine yesterday, and here's the tombstone," producing a pawnbroker's duplicate.

#### Derived terms

* tombstone engineering

#### See also

* through-stone

### Verb

tombstone (third-person singular simple present tombstones, present participle tombstoning, simple past and past participle tombstoned)
* (UK, intransitive) To take part in tombstoning: to jump into the sea, etc. from a cliff or other high point so as to enter the water vertically straight.
* (surfing) For a surfboard to stand upright half-submerged in the water (like a tombstone, above) because the surfer is underwater with his or her legrope pulled tight. Often this indicates a surfer in difficulty, either held down by the power of a wave or unconscious and unable to get to the surface.
** 2005, Bruce Jenkins, Surfer magazine, (referring to Kelly Slater) :
    Before the contest even started, Slater went down hard in a warmup session. He took a two-wave hold-down in the semifinals, his board tombstoning eerily for all to see, […]
* (transitive, computing, Microsoft Windows) To replace (an object or data) with a tombstone marker.
** 2000, William Boswell, Inside Windows 2000 Server, page 211:One of the many improvements in Windows 2000 WINS (and NT4 SP4) is the capability to selectively delete or tombstone records.

### References

* (pawnbroker's ticket): John Camden Hotten (1873) The Slang Dictionary

### Further reading

* tombstone on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
* Tombstone (programming) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia