maintop

[ meyn-top ]

nounNautical.
  1. a platform at the head of the lower mainmast.

Origin of maintop

1
First recorded in 1475–85; main1 + top1

Words Nearby maintop

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

How to use maintop in a sentence

  • Acuma climbed to the maintop and looked at the coast of Peru with a telescope, and the captain took bearings with his instruments.

    Us and the Bottleman | Edith Ballinger Price
  • The officer of the maintop was a little midshipman, James Jarvis, who was only thirteen years old.

    Twelve Naval Captains | Molly Elliot Seawell
  • It rested like a mirror all that day, and the sails hung empty and the banner at maintop but a moveless wisp of cloth.

    1492 | Mary Johnston
  • Farragut had taken his famous stand in the shrouds, just under the maintop, and hailed the Brooklyn as he came up in the Hartford.

  • He even went into the maintop again, in order to get as early and as wide a survey of the horizon as he wished.

    The Wing-and-Wing | J. Fenimore Cooper

British Dictionary definitions for maintop

maintop

/ (ˈmeɪnˌtɒp) /


noun
  1. a top or platform at the head of the mainmast

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