a term used in general for all sorts of cord, whether small, middling, or great. See Rope.

The naval cordage of the earlier ages was in all probability only thongs of leather. These primitive ropes were retained by the Caledonians in the third century. The nations to the north of the Baltic had them in the ninth or tenth centuries; and the inhabitants of the western isles of Scotland make use of them at present; cutting the skin of a seal, or the raw and salted hide of a cow, into long pieces, and fastening the plough to their horses with them, or even twisting them into strong ropes of 20 or 30 fathoms length. But these, in the south of our island, and on the continent, were early superseded by the use of iron chains. The very maritime and commercial nation of the Veneti, that were so intimately connected with the Belgae of Britain, used iron chains for their cables in the days of Caesar. But in the more distant and refined countries of the south, both thongs and these had long given place to the use of vegetable threads, and the arts of combining them into strength. In this manner the Greeks appear to have used the common rushes of their country, and the Carthaginians the spartum or broom of Spain. And as all the cordage of the Romans was made of these materials at their last descent on our island, so the art of manufacturing them would necessarily be introduced with the Roman settlements among the Britons. Under the direction of Roman artists their thongs of leather would naturally be laid aside, and the juncti, or rushes of the plains, worked up into cordage. And what remarkably coincides with this opinion is, that the remains of old cables and ropes are still distinguished among the British sailors by the name of old junk.

The nations of Roman Britain, and the tribes of Caledonia and Ireland, had inherited, from their earliest ancestors, many of the rudier arts of navigation. Their ships were large open boats, framed of light timbers ribbed with hurdles and lined with hides. These were furnished with masts and sails. The latter were formed of hides, as the tackle was of thongs. They were actually of hides among the Veneti as late as the days of Caesar; and they were never furred, but only bound to the mast. But these flight sea-boats, and their rude furniture, would soon be dismissed by the provincials for the more substantial vessels and more artificial sails of the Romans. The Roman sails, which were composed of flax in the days of Agricola, were afterwards made of hemp; and our own are therefore denominated cannabis or canvas by our mariners at present. And about the same period assuredly did the junk of the British cordage give way to the same materials; the use of hempen ropes upon land, and of hempen nets for hunting, being very common among the Romans in the first century.