whaleback
(ˈhweɪlbæk)
[f. whale n. + back n.]
1. An arched structure over the deck of a steamer; = turtle-back 1.
| 1886 Times 20 Apr. 10/2 He was standing under the whaleback. |
2. A kind of steam vessel having a spoon bow and the main decks covered in and rounded over, suggesting the back of a whale.
| 1891 Pall Mall Gaz. 10 June 2/2 The Americans claim that, in Captain Macdougall's steel ‘whalebacks’, they possess the universal ship of the future. |
3. Geol. A large mound of the shape of the back of a whale. More widely, any land form or land mass likened to the back of a whale; spec. (a) = roche moutonnée; (b) an elongated sand dune.
| 1893 Howorth Glacial Nightmare II. 774 Glaciers cannot explain the mounds called eskers, kames, or whalebacks. 1913 Proc. Geologists' Assoc. XXIV. 247 A characteristic rounded form resembling..the ‘whale-back’ of glaciated areas. 1918 Geogr. Jrnl. LI. 23 In these whalebacks and crescents the cross-section that has the longest base passes through the summit of the dune. 1928 Chambers's Jrnl. Jan. 1/2 Behind all, a dim whale-back that might be Stroma, or Ultima Thule. 1933 Geogr. Jrnl. LXXXII. 125 A whaleback is a flat-topped ridge of sand anything up to 100 miles in length, of the order of half a mile wide, and up to 100 feet high. 1952 V. Canning House of Seven Flies xi. 155 A long stretch of sand.. the long ridges of wave marks from the last tide shadowed across the rising whaleback. 1955 Geogr. Jrnl. CXXI. 476 Some British whalebacks are undoubtedly roches moutonnées, some others, and probably many tropical examples, are genetically related to tors. 1974 M. Gilbert Flash Point x. 82 Behind the whaleback of Kinder Low and Edale Head a storm was brewing up. 1977 A. Hallam Planet Earth 67/2 Where folds can be traced in three dimensions, it is found that the structures die out along their fold axis and where suitably exposed, form whalebacks. |
4. attrib. or as adj. Furnished with a whaleback (sense 1); of the shape of the back of a whale.
| 1891 Daily Graphic 24 July 14/1 The first ‘whaleback’ boat which has crossed the Atlantic arrived at Liverpool on Monday. 1894 Engineer 13 July 33/3 A new craft is expected to take part in the yacht races at Galveston. She was built in Fort Worth, and may be classed as a whale⁓back yacht. 1908 Daily Chron. 29 July 4/4 Beneath a hot sun Belgrade lies bleaching on her whaleback promontory. |
Hence ˈwhalebacked a., shaped like a whale's back; ˈwhalebacker, a whaleback steamer.
| 1869 ‘Mark Twain’ Innoc. Abroad 441 We can see the long, whale-backed ridge of Mount Hermon projecting above the eastern hills. 1879 Daily News 8 Nov. 5/7 Whale-backed station of the London and South Eastern Railway Company. 1891 Daily Graphic 24 July 14/1 These ‘Whalebackers’ as they are termed offer very little resistance to the sea. 1903 Kipling Five Nations, Sussex 19 Our blunt, bow-headed, whale⁓backed Downs. |