Channel: Humans At Sea

Category: Film & Animation

Description: Ever wondered why the terms “Port” and “Starboard” is used to denote Left and Right side on ships? Well, we wondered and went on to find the answer for you. Read on to know the interesting story behind it: During earlier days, before ships had rudders on their centerlines, boats were controlled using a steering oar. A steering oar was basically just a modified ore generally attached in a vertical direction to one side of the ship/boat. As it is very common that most of the people are right-handed in the world, most of the sailors were also right-handed, so the steering oar used to control the ship was placed over or through the right side near the stern. Thus most of the sailors used to call the right side the “Steering Side”, which soon became “Starboard”. The word “Starboard” is formed by combining two old English words: stéor (meaning “steer”) and bord (meaning “the side of a boat”) This video is a part of a series #KnowMaritime in association with @thesailorguy #humansatsea