Head earing pendants

[Don Case]

What are these? Lees has them going on first when dressing the yards but I can't find any mention of them in that or any other of my books. Lees does have a section for the earings themselves but they go on last(when you hang the sails). I've searched SOS and MSW with no hits. With Google I can't get by jewelry.
Any help please?

 

[Don Case]

Oh, maybe I'm way out of line here. Can anyone tell me whether the order of dressing for yards in Lees' book goes from the inside out, or the outside in. I'm looking at pg 158 "Topsail yards".

 

[alpayed]

Hi Don.
Lees does not explain which goes on first, but it is the horses or foot ropes. You must assume from this that he is listing them from the outside inwards.
Steel lists them in his progressive method of rigging.
THE TOP ROPE is fastened to the slings of the yard, and stopt from thence to the yard-arm, by which it is hove on-board, and placed for rigging as follows.
First, the HORSES
BRACE-PENDENTS
TOPSAIL-BRACES
LIFT-BLOCKS
REEF-TACKLE-PENDENTS
TYE-BLOCKS
THE PARRAL
CLUE-LINE-BLOCKS
TOPGALLANT-SHEET-BLOCKS
BUNTLINE-BLOCKS

The head earing is on the sail. Without meaning outside the rigging and within meaning inside.
EARINGS, one end of which is spliced to the head-cringle, with a long eye; the other end passes over the yard-arm without the rigging, through the cringle, alternately, two or three times,
and is passed round the yard within the rigging, and through the cringle, till the earing is expended, and the end made fast with two half-hitches. The outer turns are to stretch the upper edge of the sail tight along the yard, and the inner turns to draw it close.

Darcy Lever describes earings.

 

[Don Case]

Perfect. It's a shame that Lees does these weird things. I think everything is in that book but sometimes it's buried pretty deep. I have a downloaded copy of Darcy Lever but it was not a searchable copy. Tough to find stuff. Yesterday my grandaughter ran it through a program that gave me a searchable copy. What a difference. Makes this book much more useful. I was pretty sure I had within and without right but thanks for clarifying that. Am I right in thinking that Lever and Steel are the only contemporary authors of the late 18th century or is there more I should be looking for?

 

[Don Case]

Oh, something else. I've always thought that "pendants" were a separate part of something. Like "main yard tackle" and " main yard tackle pendants". Is this not true with earings or am I missing something again?

 

[alpayed]

Hi Don.
For Discovery, Steel is as close as it gets. Lever is a bit later but still good. I think there is some very useful content in Harland. (Seamanship in the age of sail)

Nobody will argue (or should not.) if you base your rigging on those 3 volumes.
I use any other information I can find to fill in any gaps.

Further reading.
Spars and rigging 1849, J McLeod Murphy and W N Jeffers.
George Biddlecombe.
Nares 1862
Seamanship B Luce. much later but awesome drawings.
There are probably more also.



This is from Steel.
PENDENTS. Large, but short, ropes which go over the mast-heads, and to which are hooked the main and fore tackles. There are, besides, many other pendents, with a block or tackle attached to one end, all of which serve to transmit the effort of their tackles to some other object: such are the BILL-PENDENT, BRACE-PENDENTS, PREVENTER BRACE PENDENTS, BURTON-PENDENTS, FISH-PENDENTS, GUY-PENDENTS, MAIN-STAY-TACKLE-PENDENT, PENDENTS OF TACKLES, QUARTER-TACKLE-PENDENTS, REEF-TACKLE-PENDENTS, RUDDER-PENDENTS, STAY-TACKLE-PENDENTS, TOP-ROPE-PENDENTS, TRUSS-PENDENTS, VANG-PENDENTS, WINDING-TACKLE-PENDENTS, and YARD-TACKLE-PENDENTS.

I guess any rope with a block in the end could be called a pendant.

Hope this helps.
Regards
Allan.

 

[Don Case]

Thanks Alan. I think I'll stick with Steel and Lever. There seems to be a lot of rigging changes at the turn of the century so I would be constantly going back to Steel and Lever to double check things anyway. And Lees is there to triple check if I'm confused. Then after that, if I'm lost, I can hit you up again Thanks again Alan.