different between left vs larboard

English

Etymology 1

From Middle English left, luft, leoft, lift, lyft, from Old English left, lyft (“weak, clumsy, foolish”), attested in Old English lyft?dl (“palsy, paralysis”), from Proto-Germanic *luft-, from *lubjan? (“to castrate, lop off”) (compare dialectal English lib, West Frisian lobje, Dutch lubben), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)leup, *(s)lup (“hanging limply”). Compare Scots left (“left”), North Frisian lefts, leeft, leefts (“left”), West Frisian lofts (“left”), dialectal Dutch loof (“weak, worthless”), Low German lucht (“left”).

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /l?ft/
• Rhymes: -?ft

Adjective

left (comparative more left or lefter, superlative most left or leftmost)

1. Designating the side of the body toward the west when one is facing north; the opposite of right;.

   Synonyms: sinister, sinistral

   Antonyms: right, dexter, dextral

2. (politics) Pertaining to the political left.

   Antonym: right

Derived terms

Related terms

• left wing
• two left feet

Translations

Adverb

left (not comparable)

1. On the left side.

   Antonym: right

2. Towards the left side.

   Antonym: right

3. Towards the political left.

   Antonym: right

Derived terms

• left turn (interjection, verb)

Translations

Noun

left (plural lefts)

1. The left side or direction.

   Synonyms: 9 o'clock, port

2. (politics) The ensemble of left-wing political parties. Those holding left-wing views as a group.

3. The left hand or fist.
4. (boxing) A punch delivered with the left fist.
5. (surfing) A wave breaking from left to right (viewed from the shore).

   Antonym: right

Derived terms

• lefty

Translations

Etymology 2

From Middle English left, variant of laft (“remaining, left”), from Old English l?fd, ?el?fd, past participle of l?fan (“to leave”). More at leave.

Verb

left

1. simple past tense and past participle of leave (“depart, separate from; (cause or allow to) remain”).

Translations

Etymology 3

From Middle English levit, ilevet, y-levyd, from Old English ?el?fd, ?el?fed, past participle of Old English ?el?fan, l?fan (“to allow, permit”), equivalent to leave (“to give leave to, allow, grant, permit”) +? -ed.

Verb

left

1. simple past tense and past participle of leave (“permit”).

2. simple past tense and past participle of leave (“have a remnant”).

References

• The Concise Dictionary of English Etymology, Walter W. Skeat.

Anagrams

• FELT, Felt, TEFL, felt, flet

English

Etymology

From Middle English laddebord, referring to the side of the ship on which cargo was loaded. Changed to larboard in the 16th century by association with starboard.

Noun

larboard (usually uncountable, plural larboards)

1. (archaic, nautical) The left side of a ship, looking from the stern forward to the bow; port side.
   • 1674, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book 2,^[1]

     […] harder beset

     And more endangered than when Argo passed

     Through Bosporus betwixt the justling rocks,

     Or when Ulysses on the larboard shunned

     Charybdis, and by th’ other whirlpool steered.

   • 1841, Edgar Allan Poe, “A Descent into the Maelström”^[2]

     The boat made a sharp half-turn to larboard, and then shot off in its new direction like a thunderbolt.

   • 1898, H. G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Book One, Chapter 17,^[3]

     Suddenly the foremost Martian lowered his tube and discharged a canister of the black gas at the ironclad. It hit her larboard side and glanced off in an inky jet that rolled away to seaward, an unfolding torrent of Black Smoke, from which the ironclad drove clear.

Usage notes

In the Royal Navy it was not until 1844 that larboard was abandoned for port in reference to that side of the ship. The term port however had always been used when referring to the helm (ie. sailing direction), in order to avoid any confusion between starboard and larboard in such an important matter. (Reference: Ray Parkin, H. M. Bark Endeavour, Miegunyah Press, second edition 2003, ?ISBN, page 56.)

In chapter 12 of Life on the Mississippi (1883) Mark Twain writes larboard was used to refer to the left side of the ship (Mississippi River steamboat) in his days on the river -- circa 1857-1861.

Synonyms

• backboard
• port
• left

Antonyms

• starboard

Translations

Anagrams

• Labrador, labrador