Object

Ship's Yardarm

A horizontal spar projecting from a ship's mast used to carry yards, sails, signal flags and attached rigging. In the processed material it exists primarily as an evoked maritime artifact—high, exposed, and structurally integral to a sailing vessel—called up by characters as a physical locus of historical threat and public exposure.

2 appearances

Purpose

To support and spread sails and associated rigging and signal equipment; as a fixed structural beam on a sailing ship it also serves as an elevated point of exposure historically referenced for punishment or as a landmark on deck.

Significance

Functions as a rhetorical and cultural touchstone: invoked to summon seafaring discipline, fear and punitive imagery (threatening to hang a captain from the yardarm), and to anchor metaphors about danger beyond known boundaries—thereby shaping commanders' rhetoric and the crew's emotional response in the scene.

Appearances in the Narrative

When this object appears and how it's used

2 moments

S2E22 · Shades of Gray

Hold Position — Studying the Void

The ship's yardarm is invoked metaphorically by Picard to dramatize historical seafaring punishments and crew mutiny threats; the physical object is not present but the image functions as a narrative device to gauge fear of exploration.

Before: Not physically present on the bridge; exists as a referenced historical artifact within dialogue.

After: Remains a rhetorical image invoked to contextualize command risk and crew psychology.

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S2E22 · Shades of Gray

Hold Position — Beyond This Place, Dragons

Mentioned rhetorically by Picard when recounting sailors' punishments — the yardarm appears only as a historical image invoked to dramatize past threats and the lengths crews would go to avoid unknown danger; it functions symbolically rather than physically in the scene.

Before: Not physically present on the bridge; exists as a cultural/maritime image in dialogue.

After: Remains a rhetorical device that reinforces the seriousness of exploration risks and supports Picard's calming metaphor.

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