A stele (plural steles or stelai, from Greek: , stele) or stela (plural stelas or stelæ, from Latin) is a stone or wooden slab, generally taller than it is wide, erected as a monument, very often for funerary or commemorative purposes. Stelae may be used for government notices or as territorial markers to mark borders or delineate land ownership. They very often have texts and may have decoration. This ornamentation may be inscribed, carved in relief (bas, high, etc.), or painted onto the slab. Traditional Western gravestones are technically stelae, but are very rarely described by the term. Equally stelae-like forms in non-Western cultures may be called by other terms, and "stela" is most consistently used for objects from Europe, the ancient Near East and Egypt, China, and Pre-Columbian America.