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THE ASTORIAN • SATURDAY, AUGUST 6, 2022
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DailyAstorian
SALTY LANGUAGE
How nautical slang makes its way into common usage
By JULIA TRIEZENBERG
For The Astorian
M
Dropping and weighing anchor on a sailing ship was sometimes an hourslong process.
During spells of bad weather, sailors
would batten down the hatches to
prepare for trouble at sea.
Sailors would swap stories around the watercooler or scuttled butt.
THE SCUTTLEBUTT WAS QUITE LITERALLY THE WATERCOOLER
THAT ALL THE SAILORS WOULD GATHER AROUND TO SWAP STORIES
WITH ONE ANOTHER DURING THEIR BREAKS. AS TIME WENT ON,
THE WORD BEGAN TO REFER TO THE GOSSIP ITSELF RATHER THAN
THE PLACE WHERE THE RUMORS WERE PASSED AMONG PEOPLE.
A water keg from the collection of the Columbia River Maritime Museum.
any living in coastal com-
munities are familiar with
the acronym CANOE, or the
“committee to assign a nautical ori-
gin to everything.”
There are hundreds of stories
fl oating around about why each
seemingly mundane aspect of our
lives relates directly to maritime his-
tory. Some stories have more truth
than others. One aspect that does
hold true is the continued use of
maritime slang.
Using the phrase “batten down
the hatches” is usually an indica-
tion to prepare for trouble. Its ori-
gins stem from sailors preparing for
rough seas by making their ships as
watertight as possible.
Typically, a ship’s hatches lead-
ing to the lower decks were left open
or covered with a grate that would
allow air to ventilate those spaces.
In bad weather, those open holes
would need to be covered with tarps
and secured with wooden battens,
an action referred to as battening
down.
The expression “cut and run”
was inspired by a ship’s capstan.
Capstans are used to drop and weigh
anchor onboard.
Depending on the length and
weight of the cable attached to the
anchor, raising it from the bottom
of the seafl oor could take up to six
hours. If a ship needed to make a
quick getaway, the captain might
decide to sacrifi ce the anchor by cut-
ting and running.
The offi ce scuttlebutt today refers
to rumors or gossip, and the origin
of this phrase isn’t far off from how
it’s used today. On sailing ships,
water on board was often stored in
scuttled butts — barrels with a hole
drilled into them to pour the water
from.
The scuttlebutt was quite literally
the watercooler that all the sailors
would gather around to swap stories
with one another during their breaks.
As time went on, the word began to
refer to the gossip itself rather than
the place where the rumors were
passed among people.
Someone who has had too good
of a time at their local pub crawl
might be referred to as “three sheets
to the wind.” On a ship, a sheet is
not a sail, but rather the rope or
chain attached to the bottom corner
of the sail.
The sheets trim the sail to
the wind, holding them in place
and keeping the ship from lurch-
ing through the water. If a sheet
becomes loose, the sail will fl ap in
the wind freely and cause the ship to
fl ail off -course.
On a three-masted sailing ship,
even just “one sheet to the wind”
could be disastrous to the ship’s sta-
bility – so “three sheets to the wind”
was pretty far along on that sliding
scale.
Today, the term “slush fund” is
associated with scandal. Politicians
or other public offi cials have been
known to be caught dealing with
this secret money, usually involving
some form of bribery.
In the maritime world, a slush
fund originally referred to the ship’s
rations. “Slush” was fat or grease
skimmed off the top of meat while it
was being cooked.
Over the course of a months long
voyage, the ship would accumu-
late a lot of slush that it would store
onboard until it reached shore. On
land, the fat would then be sold to
candlemakers.
The resulting profi ts from the
slush would be distributed to the
ship’s crew, and they would use
it to purchase things the captain
wouldn’t provide for them. Books,
special carving tools, instruments
or other items weren’t considered
essential to the voyage. Instead, the
“slush fund” would pay for them.
Julia Triezenberg is an educa-
tor at the Columbia River Maritime
Museum.