Design Nomenclature / Physical Model Making
Mortise and tenon
Also called mortice and tenon, M&T, tenon joint
A projecting tongue on one member seated in a matching hole in the other, resisting racking in every direction and offering long-grain glue surface on four faces at once. The oldest strong frame joint there is — and it is the tenon's shoulders, not the tenon itself, that keep the frame square.
Not to be confused with
Origin
Mortise arrives through Old French from an Arabic root for a fastened joint; tenon is French tenir, to hold. The tongue is literally the holder and the hole is the thing it is fastened into.