larboard

Etymology

From Middle English ladde-bord, latebord, most likely referring to the side of the ship on which cargo was loaded. Changed to larboard in the 16th century by association with starboard. (Texts from the 1500s have spellings like lerbord, leereboord, larboord, corresponding to how they spell sterbord, steereboord, starboord.)

noun

1. (archaic, nautical) The left side of a ship, looking from the stern forward to the bow; port side.
   […] harder beset And more endangered than when Argo passed Through Bosporus betwixt the justling rocks, Or when Ulysses on the larboard shunned Charybdis, and by th’ other whirlpool steered. 1674, John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book 2
   The boat made a sharp half-turn to larboard, and then shot off in its new direction like a thunderbolt. 1841, Edgar Allan Poe, A Descent into the Maelström
   Suddenly the foremost Martian lowered his tube, and discharged a canister of the black gas at the ironclad. It hit her larboard side, and glanced off in an inky jet, that rolled away to seaward, an unfolding torrent of black smoke, from which the ironclad drove clear. 1898, H. G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Book One, Chapter 17
   It means to turn to larboard. 2001, Dudley Pope, Ramage & the Rebels
   The schooner ploughed on Northerly for a minute longer, before tacking again to lay herself half a mile in advance of the nearer corvette, now up on their larboard quarter. 2004, Dewey Lambdin, Havoc's Sword
   The Java, placing herself under the same canvas as her opponent, stood directly for her; and at 2 h. 10 m. P. M., when within half a mile, the Constitution opened a fire from her larboard guns, and a second broadside was discharged before the Java returned the fire from a position close upon the larboard-bow of her antagonist. 2012, Paul Harris Nicolas, Historical Record of the Royal Marine Forces
   This time an almost defeated sigh was heard from both the larboard and starboard gun crews. Even though the larboard gun crew was up first, the starboard crew had seen what was eventually to be their next target as well. 2014, Barry D. Boothe, INFIDEL: Don’t Tread On Me