pastille

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

Pastille refers specifically to a small, round, often fruit-flavoured sweet or medicated tablet that dissolves in the mouth. Lozenge is more clinical and typically describes a diamond-shaped medicated tablet for throat relief — you would ask a pharmacist for 'throat lozenges' rather than 'throat pastilles' in a medical setting. Drop is the preferred American English term for a small medicated sweet (as in 'cough drop'), though in British English a 'drop' is more likely to be a small, hard, fruit-flavoured boiled sweet. Tablet is a broader term for any flat, solid dose of medicine, and does not imply that it dissolves in the mouth — you swallow a tablet, but you let a pastille melt. Sweet (or 'candy' in American English) is the most general term and carries no medicinal association at all. If a colleague offers you a pastille at work, they are probably sharing a pleasant fruit sweet; if a doctor recommends one, it likely contains medicine for your throat.

Common collocations

Etymology

From Latin pastillus ('small loaf, little roll'), a diminutive of panis ('bread'). The word entered English via French pastille in the 17th century, originally describing a small pellet of aromatic paste burned to scent a room. By the 19th century, the meaning had shifted to refer to medicated or sweetened tablets meant to dissolve in the mouth.