Jump To:

• half hitch
  half hitch

  noun

  a knot or hitch made by forming a bight and passing the end of the rope around the standing part and through the bight.
• half-hitch
  half-hitch

  noun

  a knot made by passing the end of a piece of rope around itself and through the loop thus made

half hitch

American  

noun

1. a knot or hitch made by forming a bight and passing the end of the rope around the standing part and through the bight.

---

half-hitch British  

noun

1. a knot made by passing the end of a piece of rope around itself and through the loop thus made

---

Etymology

Origin of half hitch

First recorded in 1760–70

Example Sentences

Given all this, I tried to make sense of the electronic shoreline with Anhinga, our 37-foot Bertram, rolling in a beam sea as the Whaler attempted to slip a half hitch around her wheels.

From Time Magazine Archive

Moreover, there was reason to suppose that all four had been bound by the same person: in all four instances the same type of knot, a half hitch, was used.

From "In Cold Blood" by Truman Capote

Now and then a farmer comes out of a store, takes a half hitch on the muffler around his neck, puts on his bearskin gloves and unties his rig.

From Homeburg Memories by Fitch, George

"I'd rather by half hitch up myself," began Cyrus; but his wife turned upon him, at the word, bundled him into the kitchen, and shut the door upon him.

From Meadow Grass Tales of New England Life by Brown, Alice

It consists in making two long bights in a rope, which shall overlay one another; then taking a half hitch over the end of each bight, with the standing part, which is next to it.

From The Sailor's Word-Book An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, including Some More Especially Military and Scientific, but Useful to Seamen; as well as Archaisms of Early Voyagers, etc. by Belcher, Edward, Sir