rowlock

English

The side of a brick which is a rowlock.

Alternative forms

• rollock, rullock

Etymology

An alteration, based on row, of earlier oarlock, from Old English ārlōc, equivalent to oar + lock.

Pronunciation

• (US) enPR: rōlŏk, rä'lək, rŭ'lək, IPA^(key): /ˈɹoʊˌlɑk/, /ˈɹɑlək/, /ˈɹʌlək/
• (UK) enPR: rŭ'lək, rŏ'lək, rōlŏk, IPA^(key): /ˈɹʌlək/, /ˈɹɒlək/, /ˈɹəʊˌlɒk/

Noun

rowlock (plural rowlocks)

1. (nautical, chiefly British) A usually U-shaped pivot attached to the gunwale (outrigger in a sport boat) of a boat that supports and guides an oar, and provides a fulcrum for rowing; an oarlock.

   Synonym: (US) oarlock

   • 1884 December 10, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VII, in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: (Tom Sawyer’s Comrade) […], London: Chatto & Windus, […], →OCLC:

     I took a good gap and a stretch, and was just going to unhitch and start when I heard a sound away over the water. I listened. Pretty soon I made it out. It was that dull kind of a regular sound that comes from oars working in rowlocks when it's a still night.

   • 1951, C. S. Lewis, chapter 8, in Prince Caspian, Collins, published 1998:

     Everything smelled salt and there was no noise except the swishing of water and the clop-clop of water against the sides and the splash of the oars and the jolting noise of the rowlocks.

2. A brick, for example in a course of brickwork, that is laid vertically with its tallest but slimmest side facing down, and its shortest face facing the outside of the wall (oriented so that it is taller than it is wide).

Related terms

• thole, tholepin, thowel

Translations

support for an oar

• Arabic: please add this translation if you can
• Armenian: please add this translation if you can
• Bulgarian: ключ (bg) m (ključ)
• Catalan: escàlem (ca) m, escalamera f
• Chinese: please add this translation if you can
• Dutch: dol (nl) m
• Finnish: hankain (fi), hankaintappi
• French: dame de nage (fr) f
• Galician: tolete m, chumaceira (gl) f
• German: Dolle (de) f
• Greek: σκαρμός (el) m (skarmós)
• Gujarati: please add this translation if you can
• Hindi: please add this translation if you can
• Irish: glacán m, leaba iomartha f, roillic f, dola m
• Italian: scalmiera (it) f, forcola f
• Latin: scalmus m
• Malay: please add this translation if you can
• Malayalam: please add this translation if you can
• Maori: rōraka
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: åregaffel (no) m, tollegaffel m, tollepinne m

  Nynorsk: hå m, keip m, keipe f, tollegang m

• Persian: please add this translation if you can
• Portuguese: forqueta f
• Russian: уклю́чина (ru) f (ukljúčina)
• Spanish: horquilla (es) f
• Swedish: årtull (sv) c
• Tagalog: lulubungan
• Tamil: please add this translation if you can
• Turkish: ıskarmoz (tr)
• Welsh: rhwyfbin m, bwlch rhodli m

References

• “rowlock”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.