REHupa

noun

1. a seat across a boat on which a rower might sit.

[origin: ca 1736; alteration of obsolete thought, thoft, from Middle English thoft, from Old English thofte; akin to Old High German dafta rower’s seat]

HOWARD’S USAGE:

“As I were mazed I lay and gazed through emerald depths untold.
The eastern sky was rosy red, the sun was rising gold.
The lazy waves they swung the bow with a gentle sway and lift.
I laid the oars across the thwarts and the boat I let it drift.

“I watched and saw strange shadows stray for fathoms down below;
Like shimmery, gossamer things of dreams I watched them come and go.
And then sometimes, like fairy chimes or a golden Chinese gong,
Strange music echoed across the sea like tones of a wordless song.

[from “Buccaneer Treasure”; for the complete poem see The Collected Poetry of Robert E. Howard, p. 204]