Ratlines

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources:  –  ·  ·  · scholar · JSTOR (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

Climbing the ratlines of STS Mir

Rat-boards and rigging of Christian Radich

Look up ratline in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

Ratlines (pronounced "rattlins") are lengths of thin line tied between the shrouds of a sailing ship to form a ladder.^[1] Found on all square rigged ships, whose crews must go aloft to stow the square sails, they also appear on larger fore-and-aft rigged vessels to aid in repairs aloft or conduct a lookout from above.

Lower courses in a ratline are often made of slats of wood (battens) for support where the distance between shrouds is greatest. These wooden boards are called rat-boards. In some instances holes in these slats guide and organise low-tension lines between the deck and the rig.

Although the name clove hitch is given by Falconer in his Dictionary of 1769, the knot is much older, having been tied in ratlines at least as early as the first quarter of the sixteenth century. This is shown in early sculpture and paintings.

— The Ashley Book of Knots^[2]

See also[]

• Footrope

References[]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Ratlines.