Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Of, relating to, or characteristic of ships, shipping, sailors, or navigation on a body of water.
 
from The Century Dictionary.
- Pertaining to ships, seamen, or navigation: as, nautical skill. Abbreviated nautical
 -     Synonyms Marine, Naval, etc. See 
maritime . 
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective Of or pertaining to seamen, to the art of navigation, or to ships.
 - adjective   See under 
Almanac . - adjective the length in nautical miles of the rhumb line joining any two places on the earth's surface.
 - adjective   See under 
Mile . 
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective   Relating to or involving 
ships or shipping ornavigation orseamen . 
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- adjective relating to or involving ships or shipping or navigation or seamen
 
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
Support
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Examples
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[NYT] "By the way, before Cashill hit on his theory, I noted some eerie similarities between Dreams of My Father and the Horatio Hornblower novels of C.S. Forester, which also contain nautical references and are written on a high school level, but I gave up my investigation when I realized that Forrester died in 1966 and probably could not have written Obama's book."
Random: Bark Worse Than Her Bite - Swampland - TIME.com 2008
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Let us not judge Ashbery too quickly … I do find his taste in nautical nonsense quite creative, which leads me to believe there is a enough of a screw loose to warrant further investigation.
john ashbery | the serious doll « poetry dispatch & other notes from the underground 2007
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Whilst we're in nautical mode, here's brave and how about this for actually having a dream and then living it?
Living the dream 2006
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Whilst we're in nautical mode, here's brave and how about this for actually having a dream and then living it?
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Whilst we're in nautical mode, here's brave and how about this for actually having a dream and then living it?
Living the dream 2006
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And whereas the cognitive tasks inherent in nautical, geographic, and ethnographic work demanded that one use his rational faculties, trips to Cathay required only that one possess a lively imagination.
The Romance of China: Excursions to China in U.S. Culture: 1776-1876 2005
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When the time is up, the number of “knots” fed out are counted to determine speed, thus the term for nautical miles per hour.
A Furnace Afloat JOE JACKSON 2003
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I dressed myself in nautical rig, and went on deck to see all that I could.
The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton William Henry Burton Wilkins 1897
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The orders transmitted to them (in nautical phrase) are amusingthey are playing an ugly tune, or a pretty one badly "Bid those follows take a reef in" or they suddenly stop "Ask those fellows why they have hove to," says the captain to the steward,
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People create ship designs for the game Pirates of the Burning Sea, researching in nautical museums, because they love to do it — some of them don’t even play the game; they just like to make ships.
Archive 2009-02-01 Rebecca Tushnet 2009
 
leaden commented on the word nautical
In case Wordnik is never fixed (which seems more likely every month), see
http://www.wordnik.com/tags/nautical
for the complete list of words tagged “nautical”.
September 29, 2011
			
		
	
sionnach commented on the word nautical
I wouldn't have expected quite so much beefcake in the visuals for this word.
September 29, 2011
			
		
	
ruzuzu commented on the word nautical
I'm a bit disturbed by the iron maiden.
September 29, 2011
			
		
	
leaden commented on the word nautical
sionnach: It reminds me of Smithers’ assertion that “women and seamen don't mix.”
September 30, 2011