Marlinspike
noun
noun ·Rare ·Advanced level
Definitions
Noun
- 1 A tool, consisting of a pointed metal spike, used to manipulate the strands of rope or cable when knotting and splicing.
"[…] the afterguard, of whom they have but a sorry opinion, chiefly landsmen, never going aloft except to reef or furl the mainsail and in no wise competent to handle a marlinspike or turn in a dead-eye, say."
- 2 a pointed iron hand tool that is used to separate strands of a rope or cable (as in splicing) wordnet
Example
More examples"[…] the afterguard, of whom they have but a sorry opinion, chiefly landsmen, never going aloft except to reef or furl the mainsail and in no wise competent to handle a marlinspike or turn in a dead-eye, say."
Etymology
From marline + spike.
More for "marlinspike"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.