Glossary of nautical terms

A list of nautical terms; some remain current, many date from the 17th-19th century.

A-D

• Above board - on or above the deck, in plain view.
• Act of Pardon / Act of Grace - A letter from a state or power authorising action by a privateer.
• Aft - towards the stern
• Abaft - towards the stern ("to go abaft")
• Abaft the beam - that half of the ship between the amidship section and the taffrail.
• Abeam - 'On the beam', at right angles to the ship's keel.
• Abel Brown - a vulgar sea song.
• Advance note - a note for one month's wages issued to sailors on their signing a ship's articles.
• Ahoy - a cry to draw attention.
• Avast - Stop!
• Back and fill - to use the advantage of the tide being with you when the wind is not.
• Bear down - sail rapidly downwind.
• Before the mast - literally, the area of a ship before the foremast (the forecastle). Most often used to describe men whose living quarters are located here, officers being housed behind the mast and enlisted men before the mast.
• Belaying-pins - Bars of iron or hard wood to which running rigging may be secured, or belayed.
• Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea - see Devil seam.
• Bilged on her anchor - a ship that has run upon her own anchor.
• Binacle - the stand on which the ship's compass is mounted.
• Binnacle List - a ship's sick list. The list of men unable to report for duty was given to the officer or mate of the watch by the ship's surgeon. The list was kept at the binacle.
• Bitt - posts mounted on the ship's bow for fastening ropes or cables.
• Bitter end - the anchor cable is tied to the bitts, when the cable is fully paid out, the bitter end has been reached. The last part of a rope or cable.
• Bloody - an intensive derivedfrom the substantive 'blood', a name applied to the Bucks, Scrowers, and Mohocks of the seventeenth centuries.
• Blue Peter - a blue and white flag hoisted at the foretrucks of ships about to sail.
• Boatswain or bosun - a non-commissioned officer responsible for the sails, ropes and boats on a ship who issues "piped" commands to seamen.
• Booby hatch - a sliding hatch or cover.
• Bollard - from 'bol' or 'bole', the round trunk of a tree. A phallic or 'sparklet' shaped ornament of the dockside, or assistance to mariners in warping into or out of dock.
• Bonded Jacky - a type of tobacco or sweet cake.
• Boom - a spar used to extend the foot of a sail.
• Bow - the front of a ship.
• Bowline a rope attached to the side of a sail to pull it towards the bow.
• Bowse -
• Bowspirit - spirit projecting from the bow.
• Bull of Barney a beast mentioned in an obscene sea-proverb.
• Bumpkin - An iron bar (projecting out-board from a ship's side) to which the lower and topsail brace blocks are sometimes hooked).
• Braile - to furl a sail by pulling it in towards the mast.
• Bring to - cause a ship to be stationary by arranging the sails.
• Buffer - Chief Bosun's Mate (responsible for discipline).
• Bumboat - a private boat selling goods.
• Buoyed Up - lifted by a buoy, especially a cable that has been lifted to prevent it from trailing on the bottom.
• Buntline -
• By and Large - By means into the wind, while large means with the wind. By and large is used to indicate all possible situations "the ship handles well both by and large".
• By the board - anything that has gone overboard.
• Cable - a large rope.
• Cape Horn fever - the illness proper to malingerers.
• Capstan - a rotating wheel mounted vertically, used to wind in anchors or other heavy objects.
• Careen - cause the ship to tilt on its side, usually to clean or repair the hull below the water line.
• Catted - said of an anchor when weighed and secured to the cat head.
• Cat'o'nine tails - the Bosuns' Mate kept the nine tailed whip used for flogging in a bag.
• Chain shot - cannon balls linked with chain - used to damage rigging and masts.
• Chase guns - cannons mounted on the bow.
• Chock-a-block - rigging blocks that are so tight against one another that they cannot be further tightened.
• Clean bill of health - a certificate issued by a port indicating that the ship carries no infectious diseases.
• Clean Slate - at the helm, the watch keeper would record details of speed, distances, headings etc on a slate. At the beginning of a new watch the slate would be wiped clean.
• Coaming - the raised edge of a hatchway.
• Coxswain or cockswain - the helmsman or crew member in command of a boat.
• As the crow flies - a navigational technique in coastal water was to release a caged crow, which would tend to fly towards the nearest land.
• Crow's nest - the highest lookout point.
• Cut and run - When wanting to make a quick escape, a ship might cut lashings to sails or cables for anchors, causing damage to the rigging, or loosing an anchor, but giving extra speed.
• Cut of His Jib - warships often had their forsails or jib but thinly to enable them to maintain course more easily. Signting a ship, one could examine the cut of his jib to tell what kind of craft it might be.
• Devil seam - curved seam in the deck planing closest to the side of the ship, next to the scuppers. A sailor slipping on the deck would be "between the Devil and the deep blue sea".
• Devil to pay - paying the Devil is sealing the devil seam. It is a difficult and unpleasant job because of the shape of the seam.
• Dogwatch
• Draft - the minimum depth of water needed to float the ship.
• Dressing down - treating old sails with oil or wax to renew them, or a verbal reprimand.
• Driver - large sail flown from the mizzen gaff.

E-H

• Fathom - six feet (once defined by parliament as "the length of a man's arms around the object of his affections."
• Fireship - a ship loaded with explosives, sent into an enemy port or fleet.
• First rate -
• Fluke - large part of an anchor that digs into the bottom (a lucky occasion when this happens on the first try).
• Fly by night - a large sail used only for sailing downwind, requiring little attention.
• Foot - the bottom of a sail.
• Footloose - If the foot of a sail is not secured properly, it is footloose, blowing around in the wind.
• Foremast Jack - an enlisted sailor, one who is housed before the foremast.
• Furl roll or wrap a sail around the mast or spar to which it is attached.
• Gaff - spar that holds the upper edge of a sail.
• Garbled - garbling was the (illegal) practice or mixing cargo with garbage.
• Grapeshot - small balls of lead fired from a cannon. Used to hurt people.
• Grog - watered rum. From the British Admiral Vernon who, 1740 the ordered the men's ration of rum to be watered down. He was called "Old Grogram" because he often wore a grogram coat), and the watered rum came to be called 'grog'.
• Groggy - having consumed a lot of grog.
• Gunwhale - sides of the hull above deck level
• Halliards - ropes used for hoisting a spar with a sail attached.
• Haul wind - point the ship so as to be heading in the same direction, to maximise speed.
• Heave to - To stop a sailing vessel by lashing the helm in opposition to the sails. The vessel will gradually drift to leeward, the speed of the drift depending on the vessel's design.
• Heave down - turn a ship on its side (for cleaning).
• Holystone - sandstone used to scrub the decks (the name comes from the kneeling position sailors adopt to scrub the deck, and the stone itself, which resembled a Bible in shape and size).

I-L

• In the offing - some considerable distance from the shore.
• Jack - either a flag, or a sailor. Typically the flag was talked about as if it were a member of the crew.
• Job - type of triangular sail.
• Killick - anchor.
• Know the ropes - a sailor who 'knows the ropes' is familiar with the miles of cordage and ropes involved in running a ship.
• Lanyard - a rope that ties something off.
• Large - see By and large.
• League - three miles.
• Lee side - the side of a ship sheltered from the wind (cf Weather side).
• Lee shore - a shore downwind of a ship. A ship risks being grounded if it does not have enough leeway.
• Let go and haul - an order indicating that the ship is in line with the wind.
• Let the Cat Out of the Bag - to break bad news (the "cat'o'nine tails" being taken out of the bag by the Bosun was bad news). cf Cat'o'nine tails.
• Leeway - the amount that a ship is blown off coarse by the wind when it is not sailing exactly before the wind.
• Leeward - in the direction that the wind is going to
• List - the ship tilts to one side.
• Loaded to the gunwhales - literally, loaded as high as the ships rail, also means extremely drunk.
• Loggerhead - an iron ball attached to a long handle, used for caulking, and occasionally for fighting.

M-Z

• Mainmast - the largest, and main, mast.
• Master - either the commander of commercial vessel, or a senior officer of a naval sailing ship in charge of routine seamanship and navigation but not in command during combat.
• Master-at-Arms - a non-commissioned officer responsible for discipline on a naval ship.
• Midshipman - a non-commissioned officer below the rank of Lieutenant.
• Mizzen mast - the rear most mast.
• Nipper short rope used to bind cable.
• No Room to Swing a Cat - the entire ship's company was expected to witness floggings, assembled on deck. If it was very crowded, the Bosun might not have room to swing the whip.
• Overbear - to sail downwind directly at another ship, stealing the wind from its sails.
• Overhaul - hauling the buntline ropes over the sails to prevent them from chaffing.
• Overreach - when tacking, to hold a course too long.
• Over the barrel - the common practice of flogging involved a sailor being tied to a grating, or over the barrel of a cannon to be flogged.
• Overwhelm - capsized or foundered.
• Pipe down - a signal on the Bosun's pipe to signal the end of the day, requiring lights to be extinguished and silence from the crew.
• Poop deck - the stern section of a ship.
• Pooped - swamped by a high, following sea. Exhausted.
• Press gang - the navy was authorised to 'press' civilians into service. Gangs of sailors would carry out this duty.
• Privateer - a privately owned ship authorised by a national power to conduct hostilities against an enemy (also called a Letter of Marque or a Private man of war).
• Reef - shorten a sail by rolling it from the bottom. Short lines were sewn to the sail to facilitate this.
• Sail-plan.
• Scuttle to cut a hole in, or sink something.
• Scuttlebutt - a barrel with a hole in used to hold water that sailors would drink from. Also: gossip.
• Shakes - pieces of barrels or casks broken down to save space. They are worth very little, leading to the phrase "no great shakes".
• Sheer - the upward curve of a vessel's longidudinal lines as viewed from the side.
• Sheet - a rope used to control the tension on the downwind side of a square sail.
• Staysail.
• Swinging the compass - measuring the inaccuracy in a ship's magnetic compass so its readings can be adjusted.
• Taken aback - an inattentive helmsmen might allow the dangerous situation to arise where the wind is blowing into the sails 'backwards', forcing the ship astern.
• Three sheets to the wind - on a three masted ship, having the sheets of the three lower courses loose will result in the ship meandering aimlessly downwind. To be drunk, and meandering aimlessly.
• Toe the line / Toe the mark - at parade, sailors and soldiers were required to stand in line, their toes in line with a seam of the deck.
• Touch and go - the bottom of the ship touching the bottom, but not grounding.
• Trick - A period of time spent at the wheel ('my trick's over").
• Port (nautical)
• Rummage sale - a sale of damaged cargo (from French arrimage).
• Skysail -
• Skyscraper - a small, triangular sail, above the skysail. Used in light winds.
• Slush - substance obtained by boiling or scraping the fat from empty salted meat storage barrels.
• Slush fund - the money obtained by the cook selling slush ashore. Used for the benefit of the crew.
• Son of a gun - between the guns was used as a place for trists with prostitutes and wives.
• Starboard
• Square meal - a meal served on a wooden plate in good weather.
• Under the weather - serving a watch on the weather side of the ship, exposed to wind and spray.
• Taking the wind out of his sails - to sail in a way that steals the wind from another ship cf. overbear.
• Weather side - the weather side of a ship is the side exposed to the wind.
• Wide bearth - to leave room between two ships moored (bearthed) to allow space for maneuver.
• Windage - wind resistance of the boat
• Windfall - on approaching a shore, a wind is sometimes experienced blowing out to sea, giving the ship more leeway. An unexpected bonus.
• Windward - in the direction that the wind is coming from.
• Yardarm