▪ I. bilge, n.
(bɪldʒ)
Also 7–8 bildge, billage.
[Prob. a corruption of bulge, ad. OF. boulge = mod.F. bouge, shown not only by the occurrence of bulge and bulch as synonyms of bilge, but also by the fact that bouge in F. still means ‘bilge’ both with reference to a cask and to a ship. Billage must be a further corruption, due to the rarity of the ending -lge in Eng.; this form seems in later times to be preferred where the word denotes a measure, from form-association with tonnage, stowage, and other abstracts in -age.]
1. a. The bottom of a ship's hull, or that part on either side of the keel which has more a horizontal than a perpendicular direction, and upon which the ship would rest if aground; also the lowest internal part of the hull.
| 1513 Douglas æneis v. iv. 78 The mychty kervell schudderit..Doun swakkand fludis ondir hir braid bilge of aik. 1692 in Capt. Smith's Seaman's Gram. i. xvi. 75 The Bilge, the breadth of the place the Ship rests on when she is a ground. 1696 Phillips, Billage of a Ship is the breadth of the Floor when she lies aground; and billage-water is that which cannot come to the pump. 1786 Cowper Odyss. xv. 579 She pitched headlong into the bilge Like a sea coot. 1866 Daily Tel. 7 Nov., We were only blown over on our other bilge, and remained fast. |
b. The foulness which collects in the bilge.
| 1829 Southey O. Newman iii, To breathe again the air With taint of bilge and cordage undefiled. 1856 Emerson Eng. Traits ii. 35 Nobody likes to be..suffocated with bilge, mephitis, and stewing oil. |
c. Nonsense, ‘rubbish’, ‘rot’.
slang.| 1908 D. Coke House Prefect viii. 99 Let's go... This [sc. an excursion] is awful bilge. 1921 A. S. M. Hutchinson If Winter Comes ii. vii. §6 And they didn't talk any of this bilge about fighting us in England. 1954 Wodehouse Jeeves & Feudal Spirit i. 11 She wrote this novel and it was well received by the intelligentsia, who notoriously enjoy the most frightful bilge. |
2. The ‘belly’ of a cask or other vessel of similar shape;
cf. belly 10, 11.
| 1513 Douglas æneis ii. i. 11 Of chost men..thai tuik Ane greit numir, and hid in bilgis derne Within that best. 1797 Nelson in Nicolas Disp. VII. 143 The great weight of stores laid on the casks..has pressed the bilges. |
3. Comb. and
attrib., as
bilge-block,
bilge-board,
bilge-coad,
bilge-keelson,
bilge-plank;
bilge-fever (see
quot.);
bilge-free a. (of a cask), stowed so that the bilge does not come in contact with the floor;
bilge-piece = bilge-keel;
bilge-pump, a pump to draw off the bilge-water;
bilge-stringer, a shelf or line of beams running round the bilge;
bilge-ways (see
quot.). Also
bilge-keel, -water.
| 1862 Catal. Internat. Exhib. Industrial Dept. II. xii. 7 A new method of adjusting *bilge-blocks on the arms of the cradle. 1961 F. H. Burgess Dict. Sailing 27 Bilge blocks, supports placed at the bilges when a ship docks. |
| 1867 Smyth Sailor's Word-bk., *Bilge-fever, the illness occasioned by a foul hold. |
| 1869 E. J. Reed Ship-build. ii. 47 The iron-clad frigates of our Navy..have numerous..*bilge-keelsons. |
| 1880 Times 25 Dec. 7/5 The vessel rolled ‘deeper’ than before the removal of the *bilge-pieces, the increase of the ballast, etc. |
| 1867 Smyth Sailor's Word-bk., *Bilge-planks, certain thick strengthenings on the inner and outer lines of the bilge. |
| 1866 G. Macdonald Ann. Q. Neigh. xi. (1878) 226 It's better..to keep a look-out on the *bilge-pump. |
| 1869 E. J. Reed Ship-build. i. 10 The butts of the angle-irons forming the fore and aft *bilge-stringers, were not sufficiently connected. |
| 1769 Falconer Dict. Marine (1789) H iij b, The *bilge-ways or cradles, placed under the bottom, to conduct the ship..into the water whilst lanching. |
▪ II. bilge, v. [f. prec. n.] 1. trans. To stave in a ship's bottom, cause her to spring a leak.
| 1557 A. Jenkinson in Hakluyt Voy. I. 333 The Trinitie came on ground..and was like to be bilged and lost. 1658 Ussher Ann. 662 Euphranor..had bilged and sunck one of the enemies ships. 1762–9 Falconer Shipwr. iii. 642 A second shock Bilges the splitting vessel on the rock. 1836 Marryat Midsh. Easy xxxi, It was one of the Sicilian government galleys bilged on the rocks. |
2. intr. (for
refl.) To suffer fracture in the bilge; to be broken or stove in, spring a leak. Also
fig.| 1728 Morgan Algiers ii. v. 301 The Ships..were running ashore and bilging on the Rocks. 1748 Anson Voy. ii. iii. 146 She struck on a sunken rock, and soon after bilged. 1870 Lowell Among my Bks. Ser. i. (1873) 223 On which an heroic life..may bilge and go to pieces. |
3. trans. and intr. To bulge or swell out.
| 1807 Vancouver Agric. Devon (1813) 369 These narrow ways are..by the traffic of the lime-carts, bilged, and forced out upon their sides. 1849–52 Todd Cycl. Anat. & Phys. IV. 941/2 The whole apparatus is capable of bilging outwards in the movements of respiration. |