Page 544 - The Ashley Book of Knots

PRACTICAL MARLING SPIKE SEAMANSHIP

3295. The illustration re resents the br.onze deadeyes of a Viking

ship. They are borrowed rom Konijnenburg's Ship Building from

Its Beginnings (Brussels, N.D.).

3296. Anderson, in his Treatise on Rigging (circa 1625), pictures

a deadeye of four holes. The French Manuel de Manreuvrier (Paris, o

1891) gives exactly the same deadeye and a method of reeving and

setting up. With more than three turns a lanyard is always hauled

at both ends, so there is no LANYARD KNOT and the ends are seized

to adjacent parts. In a modern French lanyard the center is secured

with a RING HITCH below the lower deadeye.

3297. Banolemeo Crescentio in his Nautica Mediterrania (Rome,

1607), in an illustration of the battle of Lepanto (1571) pictures dead-

eyes almost identical with those of the present day. They are differ-

ently turned in, however. The upper one has an eye strap which tog- o

gles to the shroud. Anifiano gives a reproduction of a picture of 1498

and another of 1504, both presumably contemporary, which show

the usual three-hole deadeye. A painting by Pieter Breughel, dated

1564, appears to show ordinary three-hole deadeyes without the

toggles.

3298. In early small craft, where masts and rigging were struck

whenever sails were lowered, it was the custom to set up stays with

5hiv blocks instead of deadeyes. Dutch boats of the present day are

rigged in this way. The illustration showing blocks is from a photo-

graph of the stone monument to Saint Peter Martyr by Giovanni di

3300
Balduccio in the Basilica Sant' Eustorgio at Milan. The monument

was completed in 1339.

3299. This was a common way of setting up the backstays of a

whaleboat. Whaleboat stays have to be let go instantly, so lanyards

are always secured with a SLIPPED HITCH.

3300. An earlier whaleboat lanyard having the white whalebone

bull's-eye (:)Ij.i 32 8 3). 33 OJ

3301. A white whalebone heart (i'l'/3284). This appears too com-

plicated for a whaleboat backstay lashing and it may have belonged

to a whaleboat's gripe.

3302. A rigging stopper or a fighting stopper was employed to

repair a shroud or other stay that was carried away in action. Each

deadeye was strapped with two tails. A long lanyard was rove with

a knotted EYE SPLICE at each end (see :)Ij.i2781, :)Ij.i2782, or :)Ij.i2783)'

After the tail was stopped at either end of the wounded rigging a

tackle was hooked to the handiest eye; and the other knotted eye

acted as a LANYARD KNOT.

3303. The eyes of the jib sheets and the clew of the sail were

lashed in this manner so that the sheets would lead fair.

3304. A round-turn lashing. This generally starts with an EYE

SPLICE in the lanyard to a thimble or eye in the stay; after a number

of frapping turns have been added to the round turns, the end is

secured under the last few turns.

3305. A cross-turn lashing (the name is from Steel, 1794; Biddle-

comb calls it a cross lashing) is made with a series of racking turns.
~30S .3306

It is started either with an EYE SPLICE or else a RUNNING EYE and

finished off with frapping turns. Rope jackstays were formerly

lashed together at the center of the yard in this way.

3306. A common practice on small commercial boats is to finish

off the backstay lashing with a series of HALF HITCHES instead of

frapping turns.

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