bitts
bitts noun: a frame composed of two strong oak timbers (bitt-heads) fixed vertically in the fore part of a ship, bolted to the deck beams to which are secured the cables when the ship rides to anchor.
Noun
bitts pl (plural only)
Origin of bitts
From Middle English, probably of Low German or North Germanic origin, and the English form a corruption or contraction, from Old Norse biti, probably ultimately from a variant of Proto-Germanic *bitiz. Compare Swedish beting and Danish beding.
Words formed from bitts
- bitter
- bitter end
- bitt-heads
- bitt-pins
- bitt-stopper
- bitt the cable
- carrick-bitts
- fore-brace bitts
- gallows-bitts
- jear-bitts
- paul-bitts
- pawl-bitts
- riding-bitts
- topsail-sheet bitts
- winch-bitts
- windlass-bitts
Phrases with bitts
Questions about bitts
- What does bitts mean?
- Bitts means a frame composed of two strong oak timbers (bitt-heads) fixed vertically in the fore part of a ship, bolted to the deck beams to which are secured the cables when the ship rides to anchor.
- What part of speech is bitts?
- Bitts is a noun.
Words near bitts in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: bitts (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-bitts.wav.
Cite this entry: “bitts.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bitts. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.