leeward

English

WOTD – 10 August 2012

Etymology

lee (“side away from the wind”) +‎ -ward (“direction”)

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈliːwəd/, (nautical) /ˈl(j)uːəd/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈliwəɹd/, (nautical) /ˈluːəɹd/

• Audio (Southern England)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -iːwə(ɹ)d

Adjective

leeward (comparative more leeward, superlative most leeward or leewardmost)

1. On the side sheltered from the wind; in that direction.

Synonyms

• downwind

Antonyms

• windward

Derived terms

• Leeward Islands

Related terms

• leeway

Translations

on the side sheltered from the wind

• Armenian: հողմահակառակ (hoġmahakaṙak)
• Catalan: sotavent (ca)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 背風／背风 (zh) (bèifēng)

• Dutch: benedenwinds (nl), lijzijde (nl), lijwaarts (nl)
• Finnish: suojanpuoleinen; leenpuoleinen (nautical)
• Galician: ao socairo, a sotavento
• German: leewärts gelegen, windabwärts gelegen, windabgewandt gelegen, mit dem Wind gelegen, unter dem Winde gelegen
• Greek: υπήνεμος (el) (ypínemos)
• Italian: sottovento (it)
• Polish: zawietrzny (pl)
• Portuguese: sotavento (pt)
• Russian: подве́тренный (ru) (podvétrennyj)
• Slovene: zavetrn
• Spanish: sotavento (es)
• Swedish: lä (sv)
• Turkish: rüzgâraltı

Adverb

leeward (comparative more leeward, superlative most leeward)

1. Away from the direction from which the wind is blowing; downwind.
   • 1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 23, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC:

     Some hours after midnight, the Typhoon abated so much, that through the strenuous exertions of Starbuck and Stubb—one engaged forward and the other aft—the shivered remnants of the jib and fore and main-top-sails were cut adrift from the spars, and went eddying away to leeward, like the feathers of an albatross, which sometimes are cast to the winds when that storm-tossed bird is on the wing.

   • ca. 1909, Mark Twain, ;;Letters from the Earth Letter VIII:

     No lady goat is safe from criminal assault, even on the Sabbath Day, when there is a genteman goat within three miles to leeward of her and nothing in the way but a fence fourteen feet high […]

Antonyms

• windward

Translations

away from the direction of the wind

• Dutch: benedenwinds (nl), lijzijds, lijwaarts (nl)
• Finnish: alatuuleen
• German: leewärts (de), windabwärts, windabgewandt, mit dem Wind, unter dem Winde
• Greek: υπηνέμως (el) (ypinémos), υπήνεμα (el) (ypínema), απάνεμα (el) (apánema)
• Italian: sottovento (it)
• Norman: bord du vent, souos l'vent
• Russian: по ветру (po vetru)
• Ukrainian: за ві́тром (za vítrom)

Further reading

• leeward on Wikipedia.Wikipedia