Research Note

Larboard/Port

John Harland

Although "larboard" continued in shipboard use into the mid-19th Century, it had been supplanted by "port'' in the specific case of helm orders for a long time before that. A citation from the 17th C puts it as follows:

"As to the words of sea art belonging to steerage of a ship: they are these: Port the Helm, which is done in conding or directing the steersman how to govern the ship, the helm is to be put to the left side of the ship; as also Starboard the Helm, which is as much to say, put the helm on the right side of the ship. And is to be noted that in this conding it is not said Larboard the Helm, though that be all one with Port the Helm, because the words Starboard and Larboard are of so near a sound that in case of haste the one might be mistaken for the other, by either the speaker or the hearer, to the much peril of all in general. And therefore the word Port is always used in stead of Larboard."
Nathaniel Boteler *Six Dialogues for the Sea-Service* [1634].

{John H. Harland}

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