A mooring bollard is a sturdy, short, vertical post on a ship or quay used principally for mooring boats.
Etymology The term is probably related to bole, meaning a tree trunk.New Shorter Oxford English Dictionary, 1993 The earliest citation given by the Oxford English Dictionary (referring to a maritime bollard) dates from 1844, although an account describing bollards as "huge posts" in a shipyard is also known from 1817.
Maritime use
In maritime contexts, a bollard is either a wooden or iron post found as a deck-fitting on a ship or boat, and used to secure ropes for towing, mooring and other purposes; or its counterpart on land, a short wooden, iron, or stone post on a quayside to which craft can be moored. The Sailor's Word-Book of 1867 defines a bollard in a more specific context as "a thick piece of wood on the head of a whale-boat, round which the harpooner gives the line a turn, in order to veer it steadily, and check the animal's velocity".Chris Roberts, Heavy Words Lightly Thrown: The Reason Behind Rhyme, Thorndike Press, 2006 () Bollards on ships, when arranged in pairs, may also be referred to as "bitts". Bollards made from old cannon were called niggerheads.
A conventional measure of the pulling or towing power of a watercraft, defined as the force exerted on a shore-mounted bollard through a tow-line by a vessel under full power, is known as bollard pull.
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See also Anchor Berth (moorings)
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