What does the abbreviation "pl." mean?

[samthr...@gmail.com]

Hello friends, I am reading something from the early 20th century in which the author introduces section numbers with "pl." (for those using a sans-serif font, that's a P and an L).

For example, he will say you can find something "in pl. XXI".

I know he means I can find it in section 21, but I want too know precisely what the "pl." is short for.

Thanks.

[Athel Cornish-Bowden]

From the subject line I thought this was going to be one of those
references to abbreviations on used in courses on English as a foreign
language (like "sth"), and otherwise unknown, but it's actually more
interesting than that. To judge from the examples of this usage that I
can find with Google it almost certainly stands for "Plate".

I don't think modern books go in for plates much, as it's often just as
easy with modern technology to put photographic insertions exactly
where you want them on the same sort of paper as used for the text.
They were very common in the past, however, as the results of printing
photographs on ordinary paper tended to be horrible. To avoid that they
were printed on smoother paper of higher quality and bound separately
into the final product. So one would have "Fig. 21" for an illustration
(typically a line drawing) printed on text paper, and "Plate XXI" for
one (typically reproducing a photograph) printed on special paper.

--
athel

[CDB]

Is there a useful illustration, perhaps a table, in each section? I
would expect "pl." to stand for "plate".

[Justin Thyme]

Does the reading "plate" make sense?

--
Shall we only threaten and be angry for an hour?
When the storm is ended shall we find
How softly but how swiftly they have sidled back to power
By the favour and contrivance of their kind?

From /Mesopotamia/ by Rudyard Kipling