Column headings on the table border

Question

I'm reproducing an old textbook but I can't manage to typeset the tables. The column headings, or the title of the table, should be placed on the border itself.

Here are a two examples:

The first one corresponds to the following code:

\documentclass{standalone}
\begin{document}
  \fbox{
    \begin{tabular}{llll|lll}
      & & SINGULIER & & & PLURIEL \
      & & & & & \
      & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE \
      \textsc{Nom.} & \emph{is} & \emph{ea} & \emph{id} & \emph{ei} ou \emph{ii} & \emph{eæ} & \emph{ea}
    \end{tabular}
  }
\end{document}

I have neither included the accents nor the following lines as they are unrelated to the question.

Could you post what you tried, that we don't have to retype everything? Do you really want to type a Latin grammar? — Bernard, Nov 29 '20 at 13:56
Yes, it's an old Latin grammar book of about a hundred pages, why? — , Nov 29 '20 at 13:57

score 4 · Accepted Answer · edited Nov 29 '20 at 16:34

Typeset the table normally, including the headers.
Add \tikznode commands for each header 'on the line'.
Wrap the whole tabular into a \tikznode command.
Add a tikzpicture to draw the lines.

The \tikznode command is defined and described in this answer to "How to add arrow in equations and matrix".

For fine-tuning, use the optional argument of \tikznode to supply options to tikz. E.g., for adding more space around the tabular and the headers, you can define two styles by

\tikzset{tab/.style={inner sep=2pt},hdr/.style={inner xsep=4pt}}

and add tab and hdr as options to the \tikznode commands.

\documentclass[border=5pt]{standalone}
\usepackage{tikz}
\newcommand\tikznode[3][]{%
  \tikz[remember picture,baseline=(#2.base)]
    \node[minimum size=0pt,inner sep=0pt,#1](#2){#3};%
}
\tikzset{tab/.style={inner sep=2pt},hdr/.style={inner xsep=4pt}}
\begin{document}
\tikznode[tab]{singplu}{%
  \begin{tabular}{llll|lll}
    \multicolumn{4}{c}{\tikznode[hdr]{sing}{SINGULIER}} &  \multicolumn{3}{c}{\tikznode[hdr]{plu}{PLURIEL}} \\
    & & & & & \\
    & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE \\
    \textsc{Nom.} & \emph{is} & \emph{ea} & \emph{id} & \emph{ei} ou \emph{ii} & \emph{eæ} & \emph{ea}
  \end{tabular}%
}%
\begin{tikzpicture}[remember picture,overlay]
  \draw (singplu.south west) |- (sing);
  \draw (sing) -- (plu);
  \draw (plu) -| (singplu.south east);
  \draw (singplu.south east) -- (singplu.south west);
\end{tikzpicture}
\end{document}

I will consider trying to automate the process but I accepted the solution, thank you — , Nov 29 '20 at 15:00
I may regret having made this comment later, but I do not think that it is a good idea to nest tikzpictures. Note also that the tikzmark library defines a \tikzmarknode command. Finally, while I did not try I'd think that nicematrix could be a better choice. — , Nov 29 '20 at 15:21

F. Pantigny · Answer 2 · 2021-03-04T11:34:18.420

Here is a solution with {NiceTabular} of nicematrix.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[french]{babel}
\usepackage{lmodern}
\usepackage{nicematrix}
\usepackage{tikz}
\begin{document}
\newcolumntype{:}{!{\vrule}}
\begin{NiceTabular}{|llll:lll|}
\Hline
\noalign{\vspace{4mm}}
  & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE & MASCULIN & FÉMININ & NEUTRE \
  \textsc{Nom.} & \emph{is} & \emph{ea} & \emph{id} & \emph{ei} ou \emph{ii} & \emph{eæ} & \emph{ea} \
\noalign{\vspace{1mm}}
\Hline
\CodeAfter
\tikz \draw (1-|1) -- node [fill=white] {SINGULIER} (1-|5) 
            (1-|5) -- node [fill=white] {PLURIEL} (1-|8) ;
\end{NiceTabular}%
\end{document}

You need several compilations (because nicematrix uses PGF/Tikz nodes).

Column headings on the table border

2 Answers2