Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Braided cordage formed by plaiting several strands of rope fiber or similar material.
- n. Plaited straw, grass, or palm leaves for making hats.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. Nautical, a sort of flat braided cordage used for various purposes, and formed by plaiting rope-yarns or spun yarn together; also, grass or straw plaited by seamen for making hats.
- n. See sennet.
Wiktionary
- n. braided cord or fabric of such small stuff as plaited rope yarns
- n. straw or grass which is braid for a hat
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. (Naut.) A braided cord or fabric formed by plaiting together rope yarns or other small stuff.
- n. Plaited straw or palm leaves for making hats.
WordNet 3.0
- n. flat braided cordage that is used on ships
Etymologies
- perhaps from French coussinet, diminutive of cousin 'cushion' because it is used to protect cables from fraying (Wiktionary)
- Origin unknown. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“He fondled the impression of her as of silverspun wire, of fine leather, of twisted hair-sennit from the heads of maidens such as the Marquesans make, of carven pearl-shell for the lure of the bonita, and of barbed ivory at the heads of sea-spears such as the Eskimos throw.”
“High up on the beach of the second cove from ours, we discovered the splintered wreck of a boat -- a sealer's boat, for the rowlocks were bound in sennit, a gun-rack was on the starboard side of the bow, and in white letters was faintly visible Gazelle No. 2.”
“We had also made a quantity of string, or what sailors call sennit, which, twisted together, would serve as cordage for the vessel.”
The Wanderers Adventures in the Wilds of Trinidad and Orinoco
“Even the largest houses have not a nail in them, but are fastened together with sennit, which is a line made from the root of a tree.”
“Next, Lamai tied him securely with a sennit cord about the neck and untied the cords that bit into his legs.”
“So it was, after low whinings and whimperings, that he applied his sharp first-teeth to the sennit cord and chewed upon it till it parted.”
“China soup-plate, perforated and strung on coconut sennit, suspended from about his neck so that it rested flat on his chest and half-concealed the generous swell of muscles.”
“He was brought in, heavy-featured and defiant, his arms bound with cocoanut sennit, the dry blood still on his body from the struggle with his captors.”
“Sixty feet in the clear, the dim fire occasionally lighted, through shadowy cross-beams, the ridge-pole that was covered with sennit of coconut that was braided in barbaric designs of black and white and that was stained by the smoke of years almost to a monochrome of dirty brown.”
“Uiliami blew the whistle suspended on his broad bare chest by a cord of cocoanut sennit.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘sennit’.
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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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phrontistery-s
from phrontistery.info
syzygy, systyle, systematology, systatic, syssitia, syrtic, systaltic, syrt, syrinx, syphilomania, syphilology, syntrierarch and 1593 more...
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Logolepsy
"Luciferous Logolepsy is a collection of over 9,000 obscure English words. Though the definition of an 'English' word might seem to be straightforward, it is not. There exist so many adopted, deriv...
Anschauung, Areopagus, Argus, Briarean, Dei gratia, Dei judicium, Deo volente, Duecento, Foehn, Geflugelte Worte, Gegenschein, Hakenkreuz and 9230 more...
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The Aubrey/Maturin List I'm Gonna Mak...
I'm wading through Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin novels one by one, and someday, I'll wade through them again and list all the words I learned while reading them.
Edit: I started ma...studdingsail, carronade, mumchance, grumlin-futtocks, crosscat-harpings, holystone, sennit, orlop, orchitis, negus, kevel, altumal and 1112 more...
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Just 'cause I like 'em, S
scrunch, solace, sabotage, saccade, sacerdotal, sacrilegious, sacristy, snappy, skew, steadfast, scowl, scorch and 781 more...
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technomom's Words
misology, sacerdotal, omphaloskepsis, jimjams, incunabulum, repose, trecento, chimera, tridecennary, tenebrous, purblind, floruit and 207 more...
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new from freerice
Words that http://www.freerice.com taught me
alate, anserine, fetor, adipose, ratiocination, frangible, pergola, analeptic, carom, dudeen, testaceous, sudorific and 23 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for sennit.

chained_bear "...the bargemen themselves had done all that naval ingenuity could devise in the article of whole duck trousers and white sennit hats." --Patrick O'Brian, The Fortune of War, p. 9 Feb 5, 2008