Marine - maritime

The adjectives 'marine' and 'maritime' both derive ultimately from the Latin noun mare (sea), and mean roughly 'of or relating to the sea'. However, the two words are not used in precisely the same way, and in most contexts the choice between them will not be a matter of indifference. They are pronounced with different stress and a consequent difference in the realization of the first vowel.

• 'Marine' - pronounced with the stress on the second syllable, whose vowel is a shwa, 'mer-EEN', IPA: /mə 'riːn/ - is used of what lives, or is found, in the sea. Thus we speak of marine fish and marine snails (i.e., fish and snails living in the sea), while marine biology is the study of living organisms found in the sea, and a marine ecosystem is an ecosystem in [a part of] the sea. It may also be used of human use of the sea, 'to do with shipping or navigation'.

• 'Marine' may also be used substantively - as a noun, and in turn the noun may be used epithetically (as an adjective). It may mean either 'shipping and navigation in general', as in 'the merchant marine' (i.e., the ships and crew engaged in a country's commercial shipping, by contrast with the ships and crew which form part of its armed forces); or 'a member of the armed forces trained to fight at sea' - the Royal Marines, e.g., are the marine corps and amphibious infantry of the Royal Navy. The expression 'Tell it to the marines' is used in informal speech as a way of expressing complete disbelief in what one has just been told.

• 'Maritime' - pronounced with the stress on the first syllable, 'MAR-i-time', IPA: /'mæ rɪ ,taɪm/ - means 'near the sea' and in this use is virtually synonymous with 'coastal'. Thus a maritime forest is a forest close to the sea, and a maritime climate is the kind of climate one would expect to find in an area close to the sea, i.e., moist and mild owing to the influence of the sea. The Maritime Alps are a range of the Alps in south eastern France and north western Italy close to the Mediterranean Sea; and the Maritime Provinces are the Canadian provinces with a coastline on the Atlantic Ocean or the Gulf of St. Lawrence, i.e., New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Newfoundland - they are also referred to as the Atlantic Provinces or as the Maritimes ('Maritimes' here being used as a plural noun).

• Both 'marine' and 'maritime' mean 'of or relating to shipping and navigation'. But as a rule 'marine' is used of what is physical and actually goes to sea, whereas 'maritime' is more appropriate for what is abstract and only conceptually related to the sea. Thus we have, e.g., marine traffic (i.e., the movement of ships and other vessels in a particular area); a marine compass, marine motor, or marine chronometer (i.e., a compass, motor, or chronometer used, or suitable for use, on board a ship); and the marine corps (i.e., a body of troops trained to fight at sea); but maritime law (i.e., the body of laws, treaties, etc., that deals with matters involving ships and shipping) and maritime history (i.e., the history of ships and shipping). There are, however, exceptions to this rule - e.g., marine insurance (i.e., insurance covering loss of, or damage to, ships, their cargo, or passengers), and marine law is also found, alongside maritime law.

Be careful, both in speaking and in writing, not to confuse 'marine' with

• 'marina', which, like 'marine', is pronounced with the stress on the second syllable, IPA: /mə 'riː nə/, and means 'a dock for yachts and other small pleasure boats', or as a proper noun Marina, used as a feminine forename (which is a feminine form of Marius, rather than, as often assumed, 'to do with the sea') from Latin via Italian; or with

• 'mariner', which is pronounced with the stress on the first syllable, IPA: /'mæ rɪ nə^r/, and is a formal or literary word for a sailor. 'Mariner' (with an initial capital) may refer to any of the American space probes which were launched in the 1960s and early 1970s and gathered information about the surface of the planets Mars and Venus. The Mariners is a nickname for the football team Grimsby Town. Note that the surname 'Marriner' - as in Sir Neville Marriner (b. 1924), the conductor, violinist, and director of the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields - is usually spelt with two 'r's.