THE READERS’ DICTIONARY OF SAILING SHIP TERMINOLOGY ___________________________________________________________________________ THE READERS’ DICTIONARY OF SAILING SHIP TERMINOLOGY ___________________________________________________________________________ 142 143 THIS DOCUMENT IS THE PROPERTY OF PETER TURNER ©2024 THIS DOCUMENT IS THE PROPERTY OF PETER TURNER ©2024 If any reader can provide information, please send to galf@abandos.com If any reader can provide information, please send to galf@abandos.com officer, from which to dis-rate can evolve, for defaulters. 3. The speed by which the great guns could reload and fire was known as the rate of fire. Rate a chronometer – To establish the rate by which a chronometer gains or loses each day. Rate of going – The amount by which a chronometer gains or loses each day. Also called the daily rate. Rated Time Rating – A seaman who is not an officer. Rational horizon – The great circle located halfway between the zenith and the nadir. Also called celestial horizon. Ratline stuff – Three-stranded loose laid longjaw rope of tarred hemp, used for shroud ratlines. Ratlines, or ratlings - The horizontal ropes rigged across the shrouds, at close enough intervals to form a rope ladder to the tops and upper rigging. Rattans Rattle - 1. Some Captains waved a rattle to attract attention. 2. To be in the rattle was seamen's slang for being in trouble, or to be run in for a misdemeanour. Rattle down the shrouds - The expression used to describe the fitting of ratlines to the shrouds, by means of a series of clove hitches. Razee Razzle - Occasional seamen’s name for a good time, or ran tan. Reach – 1. That part of a river visible between bends. 2. (v) To sail with the wind on or before the beam. Reaching - SMS Reach the Quarterdeck Read Himself In - +43 Reading Ready about, or ready all – The order given to the crew to stand by at their stations, ready for tacking. Ready all - See ready about. Real of plate - A Spanish silver coin worth about 6½d. in Elizabethan times. Reamer - (tge) Rear Admiral - Admiral of the Blue Rear axletree - (hgv) Recall Receipt - Capacity. Receiving ship - An old hulk moored permanently in harbour and used as temporary accommodation for newly recruited or impressed men before they were sent to a ship. Recoil guide slot - (hgv) Reconcile (vb) - To join a vessel's sides together smoothly, in unbroken lines. Recruiters - Recruited seamen. BDD Recruitment Act Rectors – Ship’s officers in the 13c, one of whom would command. Red and blue magnetic poles - By convention, the two poles of a magnet are known as red and blue. Red Cap of Liberty - ERR Red ensign - Flown by merchant navy ships. Redesign Red Eye - Rum, alternative American name. Red Herring Red Record - Register of seamen’s' complaints, started in late 1880s. Red ropes - Man-ropes used to ascend or descend the ship's sides were covered in red baize in the officers' gangway. Red Sea Men – Generic name given to pirates of late 17c/early 18c frequenting the Red Sea to plunder Country Ships. Red, white and blue - There were nine degrees of admiral before 1865. Reducing an observation – The name for the process of producing a position from observed information. Also sight reduction. Reed's Tillerless Screw - Type of steering gear. CTC Reef – 1. One of three or four strips across the top of a square sail that can be fastened up to reduce the sail's surface, which is single-, double-, or triple-reefed according to the number of reefs taken in. 2. The area of a sail between the head of the sail and the first reef band. 3. (v) Reduce sail area by gathering up part of the sail and securing it by using the reefing points. Reef band – The narrow piece of canvas sewn along the reef line, with eyelets for the reef points. Reef Band Hole ERR Reefing beckets - Beckets used with the jackline-reef, consisting of a strop with a toggle and two loops, which passes through the jack-line. Reef cringles - Cringles sewn onto the leeches of a sail, level with the reef bands. Reef earring - Short lines used to reef the head of a sail to its yard. Reefed Sails Reefer – A pea jacket, particularly when worn by a midshipman. Reefer's Nut - +103 Reefer - Slang for midshipman. Reefing halyards - The ropes used to rotate the yard in the various forms of patent roller reefing systems. Reefing jackstay - A rope rove through the grommets of a reef band, and used for reefing with a toggle on the jackstay. Also jack line or reef line. Reef knot – A knot used in reefing, because of the ease by which it can be shaken out, comprising two half knots laid in opposite directions. Reef line – 1. A rope rove through the grommets of a reef band, and used for reefing with a toggle on the jackstay. Also jack line or reefing jackstay. 2. An improvised line, used in an emergency reefing. Reef pendant - The rope leading to the after leech of a fore-and-aft sail with a boom. Used to haul the leech down to the boom to reef it. Reef points - Short lines used to reef the reefed part of a sail to its yard. Reef tackle - A tackle used to haul the reef band up and tight to allow the sail to be reefed, attached between the sail's leech and the yard-arm. Reef tackle cringles - Reinforced loops in the leeches of a square sail, onto which the reef tackle is attached. Reel - A part of the machinery used with the Logship. Reeler – The seaman assigned to reel the log line. Reelers – A pipe call originally summoning those who operated the sounding machine. Later came to also refer to those operating the hand log. Reeming beetle - A heavy wooden mallet with soft steel rings at the striking faces, used in caulking, with a reeming iron. Reeming iron - A heavy iron chisel used to open up seams before forcing in the oakum or cotton wadding, prior to applying pitch to seal it all in. Reeve – (v) To pass a rope through a block or sheave or similar. Reeve a Burton Reeving line - SMS Refit – (v) To replace defective parts and/or gear of a vessel, usually in a dry dock or similar. Reflecting circle – An instrument used to make lunar observations at sea, built on the same principles as Hadley’s quadrant, but with a full graduated circle. Reflecting quadrant - See Hadley's quadrant. Re-flux – The movement of water away from the shore, or downstream, caused by the falling tide. Also ebb tide. Regatta - The name given to a race meeting of small craft, from the name of the traditional gondola race, still held in Venice each year. Reign - To continue in use. E.g. of a ship: ‘She's ten years old but still reigns’. Reigning wind – The average wind in any given location. Also prevailing wind. Relative bearings – The day-to-day direction indicators used on a sailing ship. The eight principle directions are each separated by four degrees and are: ahead; starboard bow; starboard beam; starboard quarter; astern; larboard quarter; larboard beam and larboard bow. There are refinements called: right astern; fine on the larboard bow; broad on the starboard quarter; abaft the starboard beam; before the larboard beam, etc. For even more precision the points would be used, as follows: two points on the starboard bow; three points on the larboard quarter, etc. Relative wind – The apparent wind direction as felt from a moving vessel, as indicated by the masthead pennant. Relieving tackles – A pair of tackles, rigged in action or during heavy weather, on either side of the tiller to prevent shocks to the tiller connections. Render – (v) To offer no resistance, such as when a rope runs freely through a block. A rope renders to a block, rather than going through it. Repair – (v) To generally overhaul a vessel, usually in a dry dock. Reserve buoyancy - The buoyancy inherent in a ship's design that keeps her watertight deck above the level of the load water-line. Retinue - A Flag Officer's staff, including household staff. Return storm - After a wind change, the second and worst half of a storm. Revenue men Revenue Service Reverse frame - An angle-bar fixed to the inboard edge of a frame to form a flange opposing that on the outboard edge of the frame. Also called Z frame. Reverse laid – The term for a rope in which the yarns and strands are laid in the same direction. Rhino – Money, especially ready cash. Rhodomontados - Rascals ? Rhumb – One of the non-cardinal points of the compass. Also rumb, or romb, or wind, or loxodrome. Rhumb line – An angled line on the surface of the Earth that cuts across all meridians at any angle except right angles, as normally travelled by a seagoing vessel. Also loxodrome. Rhumb line sailing – Sailing by using the principles of a Mercator chart. Also Mercator’s sailing, or Wright’s sailing. Ria Coast – The geographical term for deep inlets and long headlands. Where the grain of land lies transverse to shore of submergence. Rib - A frame or timber. Rib and truck - An arrangement of alternating trucks and ribs threaded onto a parrel rope, to keep the trucks separate. Also jaw parrels. Ribband carvel - A form of carvel-built construction in which the battens run fore and aft inside the hull. Ribband lines - Fore-and-aft sections of a ship's hull that lie at an angle to the keel. Ribbands - The long strips of timber nailed along the outside of a ship's frames to keep them in place while she is under construction. Ribbing nail - A large copper or steel nail used to fasten the ribbands to the vessel's frame. Ride – (v) To move easily to the motion of wind and sea. Rider - The heavy timber inner frame shaped to the keelson and fixed across the ceiling, through to the frames, for additional strength, with its own floor-timbers, futtocks and top-timbers. Ridge rope – The rope forming the main top centreline support of an awning. Ridge tackle – A tackle suspending the ridge of an awning. Riding a try – Lying-to under bare poles. Riding bitts - Two strong timber or iron posts in the fore part of a vessel, used for securing the cable. Riding sail – A triangular sail set on the mainmast of a stationary vessel to keep its head to the wind and to reduce rolling. Riding slip – A short length of chain located above the cable locker, shaped to attach to a link of the anchor cable to ease the strain on it, when the ship is riding at anchor. Riding the rigging – Using a boatswain’s chair to work around the rigging when repairing it or blacking it down. Riding turn – A turn in a rope contrived to run over another. Riff raff - Unpleasant characters, from the Riff, or Berber Pirates of the Barbary Coast. Rig – 1. Clothing; rig of the day is the uniform laid down in a ship's daily orders; shore rig is civilian attire, worn for a run ashore. 2. The arrangement of a ship's masts, spars and sails that distinguished her from other ships. 3. Jury rig is a temporary arrangement or repair of masts and spars, rudder, etc. to get the ship home or to a place of safety where she could be repaired more permanently. From the French de jour. Rigger – A shipyard worker employed to replace
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