Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A loop in a rope.
- noun The middle or slack part of an extended rope.
- noun A bend or curve, especially in a shoreline.
- noun A wide bay formed by such a bend or curve.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To fold or double so as to make one or more bights.
- noun . A bend or bending; an angle, especially in a living body, as of the elbow, or the inward bend of a horse's chambrel, or the bend of the fore knees.
- noun 2. A loop of a rope, in distinction from the ends; any bent part or turn of a rope between the ends.
- noun . A narrow bay or recess in a sea-coast between comparatively distant headlands; a long and gradual bend of a coast-line: used especially in the names Bight of Benin and of Biafra in Africa, and the Great Australian Bight (on the south coast).
- noun . A similar bend in the shore of a river or a bay, or recess in a mountain; a bay-like indentation.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun A corner, bend, or angle; a hollow.
- noun (Geog.) A bend in a coast forming an open bay.
- noun (Naut.) The double part of a rope when folded, in distinction from the ends; that is, a round, bend, or coil not including the ends; a loop.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A corner, bend, or angle; a
hollow ; as, the bight of a horse's knee; the bight of an elbow. - noun An
area ofsea lying between twopromontories ;larger than abay ,wider than agulf - noun A
curve in arope
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a broad bay formed by an indentation in the shoreline
- noun a loop in a rope
- noun the middle part of a slack rope (as distinguished from its ends)
- verb fasten with a bight
- noun a bend or curve (especially in a coastline)
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Figure I is a double bight, which is laid over the top of the pack, so that the two loops hang, well down, half on each side.
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At the head of the bight is a lagoon; but the entrance proving to be very shallow, and finding no security, we continued on our voyage; trusting that some place of shelter would present itself, if obliged to seek it by necessity.
A Voyage to Terra Australis — Volume 2 Matthew Flinders 1794
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"bight" -- surrounded by ships and the men who sail them -- I might almost have been a hardy newspaper man!
Shandygaff Christopher Morley 1923
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For convenience in handling rope and learning the various knots, ties, and bends, we use the terms "standing part," "bight," and "end" (Fig. 3).
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While everybody was thus occupied with things immediately concerning their safety, nobody paid any attention to the approach of a boat, which had set out from a kind of bight in the face of the mountain.
The Second Deluge 1890
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Just where we landed was a small cove, or "bight," which gave us, at high tide, a few square feet of sand-beach between the sea and the bottom of the hill.
Two years before the mast, and twenty-four years after: a personal narrative 1869
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In this manner we had advanced about four miles to the westward by eight P.M., after eleven hours of very laborious exertion; and having then come to the end of the clear water, and the weather being again foggy, the ships were secured in a deep "bight," or bay in a floe, called by the sailors a
Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and Narrative of an Attempt to Reach the North Pole, Volume 1 William Edward Parry 1822
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-- In a floe may be natural or artificial; the former being simply a small "bight," in which a ship is placed to secure her from the danger of external pressure; and the latter, a square space cut out with saws for a similar purpose.
Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific, and Narrative of an Attempt to Reach the North Pole, Volume 1 William Edward Parry 1822
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"bight," which gave us, at high tide, a few square feet of sand-beach between the sea and the bottom of the hill.
Two Years Before the Mast Richard Henry Dana 1848
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There are always shoals of whales about that part, and it is supposed a 'bight' of the cable lying off the ground got wound up like a rope round a screw. "
Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon Robert Armitage Sterndale 1870
fbharjo commented on the word bight
a river or sea bend (baylike)
February 3, 2007