Definition of "ribband" [rib•band]

• A length of flexible wood or metal used to hold the ribs of a ship in place while the exterior planking or plating is being applied. (noun)

American Heritage(R) Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright (c) 2011 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

• "The women wear a broad bone lace ruff about their necks, and a narrow edging of the same sort round their caps, which are in the form of the charity girls 'caps in England; but as they must not bind them on with any kind of ribband, they look rather"
• "Was it that blufliing ribband, which is now the perpetual ornament of your perfon? or was it that regiment, wliich you afterwards (a thing unprece - dented among foldiers) fold to Colonel Gifborne? or was it that government, the full pay of which. you arc contented to hold, with the half-pay of an Iri (h Colonel?"
• "The window-curtains, only of white cotton, were tied up with knots of pale green ribband."