rombowline

alternative rumbowline · alternative rumbowling · alternative rhumbowline

1. uncountablenauticalOld, condemned canvas, rope, etc., unfit for use except in chafing gear.

   2 more examples

   It has probably been destroyed altogether, but Rome is a great place for treasuring rubbish and rombowline, and perhaps the old keyboard still exists, with stacks of wooden and metal pipes and bundles of worm- eaten trackers, all piled up together and forgotten in some corner of the crypt, or in some high belfry room or long-closed attic above the gorgeous ceiling of the Basilica.

   1909, F. Marion Crawford, chapter XX, in Stradella: An Old Italian Love Tale, London: Macmillan and Co., →OCLC, page 348

   The port and starboard walls were lined with three-tiered berths so close together that the occupant must enter by assuming a half sitting, half reclining position. In front of each hung a shabby bit of rombowline, dating from antiquity. It is used to keep out the air at night and the light during the day when the sailors sleep.

   1929, Viola Irene Cooper, Windjamming to Fiji, New York: A. L. Burt Company, →OCLC, page 114