in Anatomy, the articulation of the thigh and leg bones. See **Anatomy**, No. 59.

**Knee**, in a ship, a crooked piece of timber, having two branches or arms, and generally used to connect the beams of a ship with her sides or timbers.

The branches of the knees form an angle of greater or smaller extent, according to the mutual situation of the pieces which they are designed to unite. One branch is securely bolted to one of the deck beams, whilst the other is in the same manner attached to a corresponding timber in the ship's side, as represented by E in the plate of *Midship Frame*.

Besides the great utility of knees in connecting the beams and timbers into one compact frame, they contribute greatly to the strength and solidity of the ship, in the different parts of her frame to which they are bolted; and thereby enable her with greater firmness to resist the effects of a turbulent sea.

In fixing of these pieces, it is occasionally necessary to give an oblique direction to the vertical or side branch, in order to avoid the range of an adjacent gunport, or because the knee may be so shaped as to require this disposition; it being sometimes difficult to procure so great a variety of knees as may be necessary in the construction of a number of ships of war.

In France, the scarcity of these pieces has obliged their shipwrights frequently to form their knees of iron.

Knees are either said to be *lodging* or *hanging*. The former are fixed horizontally in the ship's frame, having one arm bolted to the beam, and the other across two or three timbers, as represented in the Deck, Plate CLXIX. The latter are fixed vertically, as we have described above. See also *Ship-Building*, *Deck*, and *Midship Frame*.

**Knee of the Head**, a large flat piece of timber, fixed edgewise upon the fore part of a ship's stem, and supporting the ornamental figure or image placed under the bowsprit. See *Ship-Building*.

The knee of the head, which may properly be defined a continuation of the stem, as being prolonged from the stem forwards, is extremely broad at the upper part, and accordingly composed of several pieces united into one, YY (*Pieces of the Hull*, in *Ship-Building Plates*). It is let into the head, and secured to the ship's bows by strong knees fixed horizontally upon both, and called the *cheeks of the head*. The heel of it is fastened to the upper end of the fore foot; and it is fastened to the stem above by a knee, called a *standard*, expressed by & in the plate.

Besides supporting the figure of the head, this piece is otherwise useful, as serving to secure the boom or bumkin, by which the fore tack is extended to windward; and by its great breadth, preventing the ship from falling to leeward when close hauled so much as she would otherwise do. It also affords a greater security to the bowsprit, by increasing the angle of the hob-stay, so as to make it act more perpendicularly on the bowsprit.

The knee of the head is a phrase peculiar to shipwrights; as this piece is always called the *cut-water* by seamen, if we except a few, who, affecting to be wiser than their brethren, have adopted this expression, probably on the presumption that the other is a cant phrase or vulgarism.

**Curling Knees**, in a ship, those timbers which extend from the ship to the hatchway, and bear up the deck on both sides.