galleass

English edit

1540s, from Old French galleasse, from Italian galeaza ‘large galley’, from Latin galea.

galleass (plural galleasses)

(nautical, historical) A type of rowable vessel of the 16th and 17th centuries, similar to a galley but larger, and normally equipped with sails.
- 1599, [Thomas] Nashe, Nashes Lenten Stuffe, […], London: […] [Thomas Judson and Valentine Simmes] for N[icholas] L[ing] and C[uthbert] B[urby] […], →OCLC, page 5:
  The delectableſt luſtie ſight and mouingeſt obiect, me thought it was that our Ile ſets forth, and nothing behinde in number with the inuincible Spanish Armada, though they were not ſuch Gargantuan boyſterous gulliguts as they, though ſhips and galeaſſes they would haue beene reckoned in the nauy of K. Edgar, who is chronicled& regiſtred with three thouſand ſhips of warre to haue ſcoured the narrow ſeas, and ſailed round about England euery Summer.
- 1611, Iohn Speed [i.e., John Speed], “Elizabeth Queene of England, France, and Ireland, […]”, in The History of Great Britaine under the Conquests of yͤ Romans, Saxons, Danes and Normans. […], London: […] William Hall and John Beale, for John Sudbury and George Humble, […], →OCLC, book IX ([Englands Monarchs] […]), paragraph 210, page 861:
  [T]he greateſt of their Galliaſſes fell foule vpon another ſhip, and loſt her Rudder, ſo that guideleſſe ſhe droue vvith the tide vpon a ſhelue in the ſhoare of Callis, vvhere ſhee vvas aſſaulted by the Engliſh.

vessel