Captain John Smith's Sea Grammar and its Debt to Sir Henry Mainwaring's Seaman's Dictionary

Sometime between the date ofthis appointment and 18 May 1623 (when Buckingham was raised to the dignity of a Duke), Mainwaring compiled 'An Abstract and Exposition of all things pertaining to the Practick of Navigation' (later, and hereinafter called The Seaman :S Dictionary), one copy of which he dedicated 'To the right Hob1ethe Marquis of Buckingham', and another to Lord Zouche. This work, which survives in at least ten manuscript copies, was not printed until 1644, but there is no doubt that it is the first compendious work in English on seamanship and nautical terms.2