Word.ws English Dictionary

marlingspike

marlingspike is the alternative spelling of marlinspike.

Meaning of marlinspike

Noun

marlinspike (plural marlinspikes)

  1. A tool, consisting of a pointed metal spike, used to manipulate the strands of rope or cable when knotting and splicing.
    • […] the afterguard, of whom they have but a sorry opinion, chiefly landsmen, never going aloft except to reef or furl the mainsail and in no wise competent to handle a marlinspike or turn in a dead-eye, say.1924, Herman Melville, chapter 12, in Billy Budd, London: Constable & Co.

Forms of marlingspike

pluralmarlingspikes

Questions about marlingspike

What is marlingspike the alternative spelling of?
Marlingspike is the alternative spelling of marlinspike.

Words near marlingspike in the dictionary

  1. marling spike
  2. marling spikes
  3. Marlingford
  4. Marlingford and Colton
  5. marlings
  6. marlingspike
  7. marlingspikes
  8. marlining
  9. marlins
  10. marlinspike
  11. marlinspikes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: marlingspike (page history and authors); marlinspike (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.

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Cite this entry: “marlingspike.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/marlingspike. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.