ˈgirt-ˌline Naut.
(See quots.) Cf. gantline.
| 1769 Falconer Dict. Marine (1780), Girt-line, a rope passing through a single block, on the head of the lower masts, to hoist up the rigging thereof..The girt-line is therefore the first rope employed to rig a ship [etc.]. 1840 R. H. Dana Bef. Mast viii. 18 A long piece of rope..is taken up to the mast-head from which the stay leads, and rove through a block for a girt-line, or, as the sailors usually call it, a gant-line. Ibid. xviii. 50 Some got girt-lines up for riding down the stays and backstays. 1867 in Smyth Sailor's Word-bk. |