mainmast headとは 意味・読み方・使い方

名詞

mainmast head (複数形 mainmast heads)

1. (nautical) The top of a sailing ship’s mainmast.
   • 1782, William Cowper, “Retirement” in Poems, London: J. Johnson, p. 280,^[1]

     What early philosophic hours he keeps,

     How regular his meals, how sound he sleeps!

     Not sounder he that on the mainmast head,

     While morning kindles with a windy red,

     Begins a long look-out for distant land,

     Nor quits till evening-watch his giddy stand,

     Then swift descending with a seaman’s haste,

     Slips to his hammock, and forgets the blast.

   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, “Chapter 51”, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, OCLC 57395299:

     Fedallah first descried this jet. For of these moonlight nights, it was his wont to mount to the main-mast head, and stand a look-out there, with the same precision as if it had been day.