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OP
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I was reading an article in a scientific magazine recently and I came across the word land lubber. Ooh, say it ain't so! I've (thought?) heard pirates on cartoons accuse the people on the shore of being land lovers, but that's the only time I'd ever heard the use of the phrase. Does this horrible land lubber derive from a mispronunciation of land lover? Why would such become a valid dictionary entry? (M-W says the word means Landsman.)
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Joined: Sep 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Sorry, xara - it's endemic amongst all the sailors I have known  , from childhood dinghy sailing up to thrashing through the storms off the Hook of Holland. Guess it signifies the contempt of fish for mere bicycles 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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xara, you mentioned in one of your posts, a hearing difficulty-- I have never heard land lover-- only land lubber. and i have no nautical experience! NY has a great harbor, the whole of the city is an archipelago, but there is very little nautical about it-- we are port city of land lubbers. maybe you have miss heard? a mondegreen of sorts?
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a mondegreen of sorts?
Perhaps the word came from a mondegreen? Someone mis-heard or mis-spoke and it transformed from land lover to land lubber.
None the less, the only time I've ever heard it before was on cartoons or maybe commercials for seafood restaurants. In either case, not highly literary situations, and not directed to well educated people. Certainly not from PhD's to a scientific forum in a discussion of when plants or fungi left the oceans. I have never seen this word used in this sort of situation.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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the word 'lubber' is probably of Scandinavian origin, meaning a fat, lazy fellow; this is most likely not related to the word lover. land lubber most certainly comes from land + lubber, and is meant to be disparaging.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Ah, finally! This one I know about - although not its absolute origin as a word. I note in the dictionary that, as tsuwm suggests, one meaning is a fat, lazy fellow.
"Lubber" has two other meanings, both nautical as you've probably guessed. The first (and relatively innocuous one in this case) is the lubber line on the face of a compass, used to keep a bearing between the compass needle and the direction the boat is actually headed in.
The second (and more interesting) meaning refers to a hole or hatch up through the "top" (a platform of varying width) which surrounded the mast on a square-rigged sailing ship. The top is/was used for two purposes. One, it provides an anchor for the shrouds (lines that hold up various parts of the mast and yards) - its main purpose - and, two, the tops were used for lookout purposes, usually being flat.
The hole or hatch I referred to was next to the mast, and was the easy way to get up the mast to the platform. "Real" sailors, however, went up the shrouds attached to the outside of the top and over the edge onto the top, which meant they were hanging backwards from the vertical during the last part of the climb. Lubbers were so called because they were people who couldn't face the more-than-vertical climb on the shrouds and used the lubber's hole to get to the tops. By extension, landlubbers were useless, earthbound parasites.
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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....
and the land lubbers lying down below, below, below
and the land lubbers lying down below
...
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Joined: Nov 2000
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Jo gleefully chanted, mournfully:
....
and the land lubbers lying down below, below, below
and the land lubbers lying down below
...
And I bet you have to use your handkerchief at funerals to disguise the fact that you're laughing uncontrollably ...
The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Joined: Mar 2000
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Mar 2000
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For that Cap'n Ki - you get the whole thing!
Actually, I do smile sweetly on occasions when my cast iron stomach has left me the only one still happily sailing into the blue yonder while others have disappeared mysteriously - maybe not as far below as you suggest though!
The Mermaid
It was Friday morn when we set sail
And we not far from the land
When our captain he spied a mermaid so fair
With a comb and a glass in her hand
And the ocean waves do roll
And the stormy winds do blow
And we poor sailors were sitting up the top
And the landlubbers lying down below, below, below
And the landlubbers lying down below
The up spoke the captain of our gallant ship
And a well-spoken man was he
"I have married a wife in Salem town
And tonight a widow she will be"
And the ocean waves do roll
And the stormy winds do blow
And we poor sailors were sitting up the top
And the landlubbers lying down below, below, below
And the landlubbers lying down below
Then up spoke the cook of our gallant ship
And a greasy old cook was he
"I care more for my kettles and my pans
Than I do for the roaring of the sea"
And the ocean waves do roll
And the stormy winds do blow
And we poor sailors were sitting up the top
And the landlubbers lying down below, below, below
And the landlubbers lying down below
Then up spoke the cabin boy of our gallant ship
And a dirty little brat was he
"I have friends in Boston town
And they don't care a ha-penny for me"
And the ocean waves do roll
And the stormy winds do blow
And we poor sailors were sitting up the top
And the landlubbers lying down below, below, below
And the landlubbers lying down below
Then three times around went our gallant ship
And three times around went she
And the third time around she went down
And sank to the bottom of the sea
And the ocean waves do roll
And the stormy winds do blow
And we poor sailors were sitting up the top
And the landlubbers lying down below, below, below
And the landlubbers lying down below
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Pooh-Bah
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Perhaps we should revive Jazz's request, some time agop, for a musical facilty on this board? I would love to hear Jo actually singing that great ditty!
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