New Ye Olde word of the day

[Capt Thighbiter]

LOL, Hey I like this.. good idea.

Spirketing - The planking from the waterways up to the port sills on a vessel with gun ports.

[MorganTyre]

Wow, there's a nice and obscure one. Thanks! Also, on an unrelated note. In what year did they give up "larboard" for "port"?

[Fox]

The transition probably took several years, if not decades. Coles' Dictionary (London, 1724) includes both "larboard" as a noun and/or adjective to describe the left side of the ship and "port" as a verb to describe turning the ship to larboard (as in "to port the helm") - though "larboard" could also apparently be used as a verb, as in "larboard the helm". Whether "Port" could be used as a noun and/or adjective is unclear.

[Cire]

You don't know much, do you Foxe?

[kass]

Hell, I saw "larboard" in a Wodehouse novel from the 1930s!

[MorganTyre]

Hmmm, I thought for sure I'd read that at one point the name officially changed (for the british navy anyway) by admiralty decree. Let me see if I can find that reference somewhere...

Ok found a reference in an old encyclopedia:

Owing to the similarity in sound between starboard and larboard, the word port is now used for the left side. The substitution of this for the older term was officially ordered in the British navy by an admiralty order of 1844, and in the United States of America by a navy department notice in 1896. The use of port in this sense is much older; it occurs in Manwaring's Seaman's Dictionary (1625-1644). In this usage port may either mean " harbour " (Lat. portus), the ship lying with its left side against the port or quay for unloading, or " opening," " entrance " (Lat. porta, gate), for the cargo to be taken on board; cf. " porthole."

I'd be interested in getting my hands on that dictionary.

[Fox]

I don't happen to have a copy of Mainwaring's dictionary, but since Butler extensively plagiarised it, here's what he had to say:

As for the words of sea art belonging to the steerage of a ship: they are these: Port the helm, which is done when in the conding or directing of the steersman how to govern the ship, the helm is to be put on the left side of the ship; as also Starboard the helm, which is as much to say, put the helm on the right side of the ship. And it is to be noted that in this conding it is not said Larboard the helm, though that be all one with with Port the Helm, because the words Starboard and Larboard are of so near a sound that in case of haste the one might be mistaken for the other...