able whackets

alternative abel-wackets · alternative abelwhackets · alternative ablewhackets · alternative ablewackets

1. historicalpluralplural onlyslangnauticalBlows on the hand from a knotted or twisted handkerchief, especially given as a punishment to the loser of certain card games.First known use 18th c.

   Instead of the usual sailors' games of cards and ablewhackets, there was the clicking of dice, with games of parcheesi unfolding on chequerboards of rope […].

   2008, Amitav Ghosh, Sea of Poppies, Penguin, published 2015, page 15

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   The chief amusement or game in use in the midshipmen's berth, was ‘able whackets’, a pastime in which cards, blasphemy, and hard knocks were agreeably mingled.

   1905, John Masefield, Sea Life in Nelson's Time, section IV