half deck

American  

noun

1. (in a sailing ship) the portion of the deck below the upper or spar deck and aft of the mainmast.

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Other Word Forms

• half-decker
  noun

Etymology

Origin of half deck

First recorded in 1620–30

Example Sentences

It's a sight out of a Twain lover's imagined memory: a tiny, homemade Mississippi River raft, buoyant on blue oil-drums, flapping blue canvas greetings from its scanty half deck.

From Time Magazine Archive

They could not indeed provide against the barbarity of their captains; but they secured them a space under the half deck in which to sleep.

From The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave Trade by the British Parliament (1808) Volume II by Clarkson, Thomas

Here they spent seven weeks careening; and, capturing a galley, La Bouce, the second captain, cut her half deck, and mounted her with 24 guns.

From The Monarchs of the Main, Volume III (of 3) Or, Adventures of the Buccaneers by Thornbury, Walter

They could not, indeed, provide against the barbarity of their captains; but they secured them a space under the half deck in which to sleep.

From The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) by Clarkson, Thomas

My own clothes—the clothes which I had worn when I scrambled down the fox's earth—were forward, under the half deck.

From Jim Davis by Masefield, John