Etymology Dictionary

TARPAULING, TARPAULIN,  a cover of coarse canvas, tarred to keep out wet.  (Hybrid; E. and L.)   In Dryden, Annus Mirabilis, st. 148.   It was once oddly used to denote also a sailor, whence our modern tar, in the same sense, rather than from an extension of tar to mean a man daubed with tar; though it makes little ultimate difference.   'Tarpawling, or Tarpaulin, a piece of convass tar'd all over, to lay upon the deck of a ship, to keep the rain from soaking through; also a general name for a common seaman, because usually cloathed in such canvass;' Blount's Gloss., ed. 1674; Phillips, ed. 1706.   And see Trench, Select Gloss., who gives two quotations for tarpaulin = sailor, viz. from Smollett, Rod. Random, vol. i. c. 3, and Turkish Spy, letter 2.   Compounded of tar and palling.   β. A palling is a covering, from pall, verb, to cover, which from pall, sb., Lat. palla; see Pall.   'Come, thick night, And pall thee in the dunnest smoke of hell;' Macb. i. 5. 52.   'Pauling, a covering for a cart or waggon, Lincolnshire;' Halliwell.