picquet

A game at cards played between two persons, with thirty-two cards, all the deuces, threes, fours, fives, and sixes, being set aside.

A stake driven into the ground.

“a picket fence”

A type of punishment by which an offender had to rest his or her entire body weight on the top of a small stake.

A tool in mountaineering that is driven into the snow and used as an anchor or to arrest falls.

One of the soldiers or troops placed on a line forward of a position to warn against an enemy advance; or any unit (for example, an aircraft or ship) performing a similar function.

(sometimes figurative) A sentry.

A protester positioned outside an office, workplace etc. during a strike (usually in plural); also the protest itself.

“Pickets normally endeavor to be non-violent.”

The card game piquet.

To protest, organized by a labour union, typically in front of the location of employment.

To enclose or fortify with pickets or pointed stakes.

To tether to, or as if to, a picket.

“to picket a horse”

To guard, as a camp or road, by an outlying picket.

To torture by forcing to stand with one foot on a pointed stake.