whaleship

plural whaleships

1. A ship used for hunting whales.

   Near-synonym: whaler

   2 more examples

   For many years past the whaleship has been the pioneer in ferreting out the remotest and least known parts of the earth. She has explored seas and archipelagoes which had no chart, where no Cook or Vancouver had ever sailed.

   1851, Herman Melville, Moby-Dick

   Mystic’s maritime history dates to its days as a shipbuilding center, a time well preserved at the Mystic Seaport Museum, the world’s leading and largest of its kind, home to the famed 1800s whaleship, Charles W. Morgan.

   2017 April 2, Tara Donaldson, “5 quiet U.S. coastal towns that offer a seaside escape”, in CNN

   Synonyms: whaler