gallies

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A form of galley — A long, slender ship propelled primarily by oars, whether having masts and sails or not; usually a rowed warship used in the Mediterranean from the 16th century until the modern era.

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Meanings

noun
  1. obsoletepluralplural of galley

    In fine, we got the better, took a Four-bank’d Galley, and ſunk another, after having kill’d all the Men on board: We made a great Slaughter likewiſe amongſt the Soldiers that were in the other Gallies, and had not Night protected ’em, ſhould have taken all their Fleet.

    1705, Martin Bladen, transl., C. Julius Cæsar’s Commentaries of His Wars in Gaul, and Civil War with Pompey. To Which Is Added Aulus Hirtius or Oppius’s Supplement of the Alexandrian, African and Spanish Wars. With the Author’s Life. […], London: […] Richard Smith, […], page 281
    2 more examples

    It is many years ſince Charles the firſt Roman emperor, of famous memory, aſſaulted that city, where he received the loſs of many of his gallies, and his army diſſipated; and it is now the 27th of March 1638, when by a diver was diſcovered much of the ruins of that armada, and weighed by the Algiers, the whole ſide of a galley intire, and the timber as new, beſides three pieces of braſs ordnance, and five pieces of plate; […]

    1745, A Collection of Voyages and Travels, Consisting of Authentic Writers in Our Own Tongue, Which Have Not Before Been Collected in English, or Have Only Been Abridged in Other Collections. […], volume II, London: […] Thomas Osborne […], page 472, column 2

    Provided alſo, That this act ſhall not extend, nor ſhall be prejudicial to the licence granted by our ſovereign lord the King by his letters patents, bearing date the xxiiij. day of July, the xxvi. year of his reign, to our lady the queen his companion, to ſhip and carry by her, her deputies, aſſigns, or creditors, wools, woolfels, and tin, after the form and effect of the ſaid letters patents, ſo that the ſaid wools, woolfels, and tin, and every of them ſhall be and be ſhipped in galley or gallies, carack or caracks, and carried by the ſtreights of Marrock.

    1762, Danby Pickering, The Statutes at Large, from the First Year of King Henry V. to the Twenty-Second Year of King Edw. IV. Inclusive. […], volume III, Cambridge: […] Joseph Bentham, […]; for Charles Bathurst, […], page 292
  2. pluralplural of gally (archaic form of galley)

    In the Year 1746, an Indian of Buenos Ayres having been condemned to the Gallies at Cadiz, proposed to the Governor to purchase his Liberty by exposing his Life at a public Festival.

    1761, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, A discourse upon the origin and foundation of the inequality among mankind, page 200

Rhymes & wordplay

Anagrams

sillage
Cite this entry
APA

gallies. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gallies

MLA

“gallies.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gallies. Accessed November 3, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “gallies,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/gallies.

Source: gallies on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.