luff
See also: Luff
English
Etymology
From (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Old French lof. Collins English Dictionary states that this word is ultimately derived from (deprecated template usage) [etyl] Middle Dutch loef.[1] Ellert Ekwall's Shakspere's Vocabulary: its etymological elements (1903) related this verb and loof instead to the East Frisian verb lofen, lufen, which would make it cognate to the French term lover.
Pronunciation
Noun
luff (plural luffs)
- (nautical) The vertical edge of a sail that is closest to the direction of the wind.
- By easing the halyard, the luff of the sail was made to sag to leeward.
- (nautical) The act of sailing a ship close to the wind.
- (nautical) The roundest part of a ship's bow.
- (nautical) The forward or weather leech of a sail, especially of the jib, spanker, and other fore-and-aft sails.
Translations
vertical edge of a sail
|
act of sailing close to the wind
roundest part of a ship's bow
forward or weather leech of a sail
Verb
luff (third-person singular simple present luffs, present participle luffing, simple past and past participle luffed)
- (nautical, of a sail, intransitive) To shake due to being trimmed improperly.
- 1993, John Banville, Ghosts:
- I thought how my life is like a little boat and I must hold the tiller steady against the buffeting of wind and waves, and how sometimes, like this morning, I lose my hold somehow and the sail luffs helplessly and the little vessel wallows, turning this way and that in the swell.
- (nautical, of a boat, intransitive) To alter course to windward so that the sails luff. (Alternatively luff up)
- (nautical, transitive) to let out [a sail] so that it luffs.
- (mechanical) To alter the vertical angle of the jib of a crane so as to bring it level with the load.
Derived terms
Derived terms
References
- ^ “luff”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
Categories:
- English terms derived from Old French
- English terms derived from Middle Dutch
- English 1-syllable words
- English terms with IPA pronunciation
- Rhymes:English/ʌf
- English lemmas
- English nouns
- English countable nouns
- en:Nautical
- English terms with usage examples
- English verbs
- English intransitive verbs
- English terms with quotations
- English transitive verbs