mizzen
Americannoun
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a fore-and-aft sail set on a mizzenmast.
adjective
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of or relating to a mizzenmast.
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noting a sail, yard, boom, etc., or any rigging belonging to a mizzen lower mast or to some upper mast of a mizzenmast.
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noting any stay running aft and upward to the head of a mizzen lower mast or some specified upper mast of a mizzenmast.
mizzen topmast stay.
noun
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a sail set on a mizzenmast
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short for mizzenmast
adjective
Etymology
Origin of mizzen
1375–1425; late Middle English meson, mesan, probably < Italian mezzana
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
I now have to keep fencing with Accrux while I have managed to throw your sword flying and getting stuck into the mizzen mast.
From Economist • Nov. 15, 2012
Isabel and the Sea will make even a coal miner imagine himself "running free under number-two jib, staysail, mainsail, and mizzen . . . setting course for the volcanic island of Stromboli."
From Time Magazine Archive
To its critics, it seemed a perfectly preserved specimen of 19th century British culture, like a sailing ship in a sealed bottle�even to the Union Jack at the mizzen top.
From Time Magazine Archive
The top of the Bristol's mainmast was shot clean off, and her mizzen was splintered.
From Time Magazine Archive
The spanker was set, with the mizzen and maintopmast staysail, and the helm put down to bring her round; but there was no racing of the cliffs to port.
From Denis Dent A Novel by Hornung, Ernest W.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
