backstay

[bak-stey]

noun

Machinery. a supporting or checking piece in a mechanism.

Building Trades. an anchored tension member, as a cable, permanently or temporarily supporting a compression member, as a tower or pole, subject to a pull above its base from the opposite direction.

a strip of leather at the back of a shoe used for reinforcement and sometimes to connect the quarters.

Nearby words

Origin of backstay

First recorded in 1860–65; back¹ + stay²

backstay

[bak-stey]

noun

Nautical. any of various shrouds forming part of a vessel's standing rigging and leading aft from masts above a lower mast to the sides or stern of the vessel in order to reinforce the masts against forward pull.

Origin of backstay

First recorded in 1620–30; back¹ + stay³

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for backstay

Setting every shroud and backstay singing shanties to the stars?
Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, November 17, 1920|Various
It is kept steady by a backstay on each side of the foretopmast-stay.
Every Boy's Book: A Complete Encyclopdia of Sports and Amusements|Various
But Ulysses lashed the keel to the mast with the backstay, and on these he sat, borne by the winds across the sea.
Stories of the Old world|Alfred John Church
I felt at times willing to quit my feeble hold of a backstay or shroud, and seek repose by diving into the briny billows beneath.
Jack in the Forecastle|John Sherburne Sleeper

He kept his clutch on the backstay with the dizzy notion that this saved him from clutching some one's throat.
The Skipper and the Skipped|Holman Day

British Dictionary definitions for backstay

backstay

noun

nautical a stay leading aft from the upper part of a mast to the deck or stern

machinery a supporting piece or arresting part

anything that supports or strengthens the back of something, such as leather covering the back seam of a shoe

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012