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Ships & Ways of Other Days

Chapter 16: GLOSSARY
By E. Keble Chatterton
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About This Book

A comprehensive, illustrated survey traces the development of ships, seamanship, and navigation from prehistoric craft through Mediterranean and Roman advances, Viking techniques, and medieval innovations to the Age of Discovery and the later evolution of merchant and naval designs. It combines technical descriptions, historical narrative, and detailed plates and plans to explain hull forms, rigging, anchors, tackle, navigational instruments, and shipyard practice, while highlighting how construction methods, sailing techniques, and maritime culture changed across successive eras.

GLOSSARY

Bittacle (Binnacle).  See pp. 214 and 253.
Bitts. Posts on a deck to which cables, etc., could be fastened.
Bolt-ropes. Ropes round the edge of a sail to prevent tearing.
Bonnets. See p. 158.
Boxhauling. See p. 252.
Brails. Small ropes used for the purpose of shortening a ship’s canvas.
Careen. To lay a ship over on to her side for the purpose of cleaning, caulking, etc.
Catheads. Short projecting beams serving as a bracket to suspend the anchor clear of the bows.
Drabler. Canvas laced on the bonnet of a sail to give it more drop.
Driver. A large squaresail set occasionally upon the mizzen-yard or gaff.
Dunnage. Loose wood or other material packed in the hold with the cargo to prevent it from shifting.
Fothering. See p. 262.
Gaff. A spar used for extending the upper edge of a fore-and-aft rectangular sail.
Gripe, to. To come up into the wind in spite of the helm.
Gripe of a ship. 1. The sharpness of her stern under the water. 2. A projection added to the keel.
Gripes. Lashings securing a boat in its place.
Ground-tackle. Ropes and tackle used in connection with anchors and mooring apparatus generally.
Hawse-pipes. The metal linings to the hawse-holes or holes in a ship’s bows through which the cable passes.
Hog, to. To scrub a ship with flat scrubbing brooms called hogs.
Manger. A small apartment made in the ship’s bows to catch the water flowing through the hawse-holes.
Mizzen. The aftermost mast of a vessel with two or more masts. Sometimes called a jigger. In medieval four-masters the aftermost mast was called the bonaventure mizzen, and the one immediately forward of this the main mizzen.
Moonrakers. Sails above the sky-sails.
Parral. A band for keeping the end of a yard to the mast.
Pinch, to. To sail close-hauled.
Quant, to. To propel a craft along shallow water-ways by means of a long pole.
Rhumb-line. The line (cutting all the meridians at the same angle) which is followed by a ship sailing on one course.
Scarfing. See p. 282.
Scuppers. Gutters or channels along the outer edge of a deck by which water runs off.
Snatch-blocks. Iron-bound blocks with an opening in which the bight of a rope may be laid without threading the end of the rope through.
Stringer. A strip of timber running round a ship internally in line with the deck.
Swatch-way. A narrow sound or channel of water among sand-banks.
Tabernacle. The socket or hinged post for a mast that can be lowered at will to pass under bridges, etc.
Trestle-trees. See p. 207.
Tumble-home. The incline inwards of a ship’s sides above the level of its extreme breadth.
Ware. To veer.