cat-head

Noun

cathead (plural catheads)

1. A heavy piece of timber projecting somewhat horizontally from each side of the bow of a ship on which an anchor is raised or lowered, and secured when not used, from its stock end.
   • "Hurrah, for the last time," said the mate; and the anchor came to the cat-head to the tune of "Time for us to go," with a loud chorus. Everything was done quick, as though it were for the last time.1840, R[ichard] H[enry] D[ana], Jr., chapter XXIX, in Two Years before the Mast. […] (Harper’s Family Library; no. CVI), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers […], →OCLC, page 349
2. A decorative element at the end of such a timber that often depicts a cat's head.
3. A (small) capstan (“vertical cylindrical machine that revolves on a spindle, used to apply force to cables, ropes, etc.”) or windlass (“type of winch”) forming part of hoisting machinery.
4. (UK, dialectal) A nodule of ironstone containing fossil remains.
   • A piece of a ferruginous ſtoney Nodule having in it 3 Leaves of a capillary Plant […] Theſe Nodules, vvith Leaves in them, are called Catheads, and ſeem to conſiſt of a ſort of Iron-Stone, not unlike that vvhich is found very plentifully at Robinshood's-Bay in Yorkſhire, and in the Rocks near...1729, J[ohn] Woodward, “A Catalogue of the Plants in Stone, Contained in the First Classis”, in An Attempt towards a Natural History of the Fossils of England; […], tome I, London: […] F[rancis]...

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