cross-writing
cross-writing noun: a 19th-century technique for saving paper and postage by writing a letter in one direction, then turning the page ninety degrees and writing perpendicularly across the first set of text, creating two layers of text; a practical solution to expensive postal rates, especially before modern postal reforms, allowing more information to fit on a single sheet. Also the present participle and gerund of cross-write.
Noun
cross-writing (countable and uncountable, plural cross-writings)
- A 19th-century technique for saving paper and postage by writing a letter in one direction, then turning the page ninety degrees and writing perpendicularly across the first set of text, creating two layers of text; a practical solution to expensive postal rates, especially before modern postal reforms, allowing more information to fit on a single sheet.
Also used as
cross-writing is also the present participle and gerund of cross-write.
Forms of cross-writing
| plural | cross-writings |
|---|
Questions about cross-writing
- What does cross-writing mean?
- Cross-writing means a 19th-century technique for saving paper and postage by writing a letter in one direction, then turning the page ninety degrees and writing perpendicularly across the first set of text, creating two layers of text; a practical solution to expensive postal rates, especially before modern postal reforms, allowing more information to fit on a single sheet.
- What part of speech is cross-writing?
- Cross-writing is a noun.
- What is the plural of cross-writing?
- The plural of cross-writing is cross-writings.
Words near cross-writing in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: cross-writing (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Cite this entry: “cross-writing.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cross-writing. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.