Definitions
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Same as cross-staff, 1.
Wiktionary
- n. nautical An instrument formerly used at sea for taking the altitudes of heavenly bodies, later replaced by the sextant.
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Naut.) An instrument formerly used at sea for taking the altitudes of heavenly bodies, now superseded by the sextant; -- called also
cross-staff .
Etymologies
- fore- + staff (Wiktionary)
Examples
“Schouten and other heroic marine worthies of distant times had navigated the globe, discovered new worlds, penetrated into the most secret solitudes of the deep without any notion of longitude and with no better instruments to take the sun's height than the forestaff and astrolabe.”
“Here also our gunner took an observation with his forestaff, to determine our latitude, and he found now, that having marched about thirty-three days northward, we were in 6 degrees 22 minutes south latitude.”
The Life, Adventures & Piracies of the Famous Captain Singleton
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘forestaff’.
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Interesting words
A list of words that are odd or words that I have looked up.
concupiscence, brize, scree, scoria, forestaff, spanaemia, valetudinarianism, distasture, pyrethrum, laudanum, gentian, bicameral and 11184 more...
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Brochettes of Random Palavery
Another of my random palavery lists for words or phrases that haven't yet found a place in one or more of my other lists.
nonexclusivity, adaptationist, paxillin, adduct, unblushingly cribbed, ptomaïne, microsievert, millisievert, too big to jail, tastemaker, tinsmithing, Nimzo-Indian and 1616 more...
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Ffine ffettle
Words ending in double F
bailiff, mastiff, pontiff, plaintiff, distaff, dandruff, biff, blastoff, brushoff, bluff, buff, caitiff and 51 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for forestaff.
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