Carry On, Mr. Bowditch

Aft means in the direction of or near the rear of the ship.

The anchor watch refers to one or more sailors who stand watch at night when the ship is at anchor.

Ballast is weight that keeps the ship from rocking and tossing around in the water; if the ship doesn’t have a cargo, it might use barrels of seawater for ballast instead.

The beam is the widest part of the ship.

To beat out of harbor is to force your way out of harbor against the wind.

This is a piece of wood or metal used to secure ropes.

Berth is the space around a vessel; to give something a wide berth means to leave a lot of space between the ship and the nearest obstacle; sometimes refers to the space set aside for a ship at port, the place where each sailor sleeps, or a job on a ship.

The binnacle is a waist-high cabinet located in front of the steering wheel (check name) where navigation instruments like compasses are stored.

The capstan is a rotating machine used to raise anchors.

The captain’s walk is a railed platform on the top of a house overlooking the water where a person could stand watching for returning ships; it could also be called a Widow’s Walk, referring to women watching—sometimes in vain—for their husbands to come home from sea.

The cathead is a wooden beam that stands out from the side of a ship and is used to raise and lower the anchor and prevents the anchor from striking and damaging the side of the ship.

Chafing gear is a protective covering on rope or canvas used to protect the rigging of a ship from damage by rubbing.

This means that the wind is forcing you toward land and you have to fight your way into the wind; If your ship can’t claw off, then you have to drop anchor on your windward side and try to hold the ship in place.

The practice of raising enough sail that a sudden hard wind could snap your mast; the more sails you have, the faster your ship can go, but you run the risk of damaging and possibly even sinking your ship.

Dead reckoning is estimating your position based only on your speed and on known landmarks.

Every watch is four hours long; there are six watches in one day. The watches are divided up between the crew. Half the crew stands one watch while the other half rests. However, that means that every day, one half of the crew has to stand two watches in the middle of the night from 8 PM to midnight and 4 AM to 8 AM. To avoid that, they created a “dog watch” which is one watch split in half to make two every day from 4 PM until 6 PM, and 6 PM until 8 PM. That way, the watches are rotated so that the crewmen who stood the 8 PM to midnight watch one night will stand the midnight to 4 AM watch the next night.

A term meaning to go around a cape.

Fakes means coiling a rope so that the loops lie one beside the other instead of one on top of the other; this way, the rope is less likely to tangle when it is run out.

A fathom is six feet, about the distance a sailor could reach if he stretched his arms straight out on either side.

This is the front of the ship where the ordinary crew sleep while the officers and captain sleep in the back of the ship; the forecastle is in front of the mast, so to “sail before the mast” means to work as a common seaman.

Fore chains are platforms built along the sides of the ship for the sailors to stand on while taking soundings; the name comes from the chain strong at waist height to prevent a sailor from falling overboard.

A rope used to hoist something like a sail or ladder is called a halyard; derived from the term “to haul yards,” as in yards of sail.

Holystone is a soft, brittle sandstone used to scrub the decks of ships.

In ballast means that a ship is carrying no cargo, only ballast.

This is the left side of a ship when you are facing forward, replaced by “port” around 1850; since ancient ships were steered with a paddle on the right side (the “steer” board), they had to come to port and load cargo on the left side.

The lead is a heavy lead weight at the end of a line that could measure how far away the sea bottom was.

A letter of marque was a license from the government saying that a ship was allowed to act as a Privateer; usually, the owner of the ship had to pay money up front to ensure that his crew would not attack any ship that wasn’t owned by an enemy nation.

A term referring to transporting cargo from the ship to shore using a flat-bottomed boat called a lighter; this was done in shallow harbors when a ship was too big to come all the way to the dock.

A wedge-shaped section of wood attached to a line is called a log; when thrown overboard, the log would stand still in the water where it was thrown while the ship continued to move; the line would reel out, and a watcher would measure how much line wheeled out in a particular period of time.

Terms referring to the main method of navigation at sea: the log checks the speed, the lookout warns of dangers they can see, and the lead measures the distance to the bottom of the ocean and warns of dangers under the surface like shoals and reefs.

A rope with knots tied at every seven fathoms, the log line is why the ship speed was recorded in knots; the log would stand still, and the ship would measure how many knots passed in half a minute.

The sailor in a lookout station at the top of the main mast was to watch for threats or obstacles.

Short for “landlubber,” lubber means someone who is ignorant about ships and ship life.

Any powerful battleship was called a man-o-war.

This is a special kind of timekeeper that is carried on a ship and used to calculate the ship’s location by measuring the positions of celestial bodies like sun, moon and stars and comparing those measurements to the time in London at that moment.

A spike between six and eight inches long, the marlin spike was used by sailors to work with ropes.

Off soundings means being in open sea where the crew can no longer touch the seafloor with a line 100-fathoms long.

A privateer is any ship with a Letter of Marque from a government saying that it is essentially a privately owned warship that can attack, capture, and sell ships belonging to an enemy nation.

The raised deck just behind the main mast where the captain commands the ship is called the quarterdeck.

The quartermaster is responsible for making sure that all of the crew have the food, water, and equipment they need; on a merchant ship, the quartermaster is also in charge of cargo and has the right to buy and sell personal cargo of his own.

A term for making a sail smaller by folding or rolling up one edge.

To ride high is to be anchored.

This is the region between the latitudes 40° and 50° which tends to be particularly stormy, especially where there are no large continental landmasses to block and slow the winds.

The royal sail is a small sail mounted at the very top of the mast used on larger ships with very tall masts.

Scuppers are holes in the side of a boat that allow water to run off the deck rather than pooling there; being “scuppers under” means that the ship is rolling so much or the waves are so high that water is coming over the ship and pouring across the decks.

This means to measure your latitude based on the position of the sun.

This is when water is coming over the sides of the ship, particularly in rough seas.

The stern is the back of the ship.

This is the person who supervises the cargo who is responsible for buying and selling cargo on behalf of the ship owner and is entitled to buy and sell cargo of their own.

Specie is money in coins.

This is the right side of the ship when facing forward; comes from the phrase “steer board,” which refers to a hand-held rudder used to steer a boat and which was mounted on the right side.

This is measuring your position using the position of the moon in relation to a star.

Tompion is a wooden stopper to cover the muzzle of a gun—especially necessary on a ship when you don’t want the inside of your cannons to get wet.

Top sails are sails mounted above another sail.

The tophamper is the upper sails and their spars and rigging—sometimes used for anything cumbersome above the deck.

To trim sail is to adjust your sails to take best advantage of wind conditions.

This is when someone sleeps with their clothes on, ready to get up again at a moment’s notice.