transverse

transverse adjective: situated or lying across; side to side, relative to some defined "forward" direction; perpendicular or slanted relative to the "forward" direction; identified with movement across areas.

Adjective

transverse (not comparable)

Situated or lying across; side to side, relative to some defined "forward" direction; perpendicular or slanted relative to the "forward" direction; identified with movement across areas.
- The units have transverse seats, two and three astride the passageway with single or double longitudinal seats alongside the two entrance vestibules in each car.1960 November, “New electric multiple-units for British Railways: Glasgow Suburban”, in Trains Illustrated, page 660
- Unlike the older trains, the new units have walk-through carriages and longitudinal rather than transverse seating.2023 February 22, Paul Stephen, “TfL reveals first of new B23s for Docklands Light Railway”, in RAIL, number 977, page 12
Antonyms:

longitudinal, crosswise
Made at right angles to the long axis of the body.
(of an intersection) Not tangent, so that a nondegenerate angle is formed between the two things intersecting. (For the general definition, see Transversality (mathematics) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia )
(obsolete) Not in direct line of descent; collateral.

Noun

transverse (plural transverses)

Anything that is transverse or athwart, such as a road or a ship's web frame.
The longer, or transverse, axis of an ellipse.

Verb

transverse (third-person singular simple present transverses, present participle transversing, simple past and past participle transversed)

(transitive) To lie or run across; to cross.
(transitive) To traverse or thwart.
(transitive) To overturn.
- And so long shall her censures, when justly passed, have their effect: how then can they be altered or transversed, suspended or superseded, by a temporal government, that must vanish and come to nothing?1702, Charles Leslie, The Case of the Regale and of the Pontificate Stated, page 226
(transitive) To alter or transform.
- In love, it is said, all stratagems are fair, and many little ladies transverse the axiom by applying it to discover the secrets of their friends.1859, George Meredith, chapter 13, in The Ordeal of Richard Feverel, page 68
(obsolete, transitive) To change from prose into verse, or from verse into prose.
- Bayes: Why, thus, Sir; nothing so easy when understood; I take a book in my hand, either at home or elsewhere, for that's all one, if there be any wit in't, as there is no book but has some, I transverse it; that is, if it be prose, put it into verse, (but that takes up some time) and if it be...1671, George Villiers, The Rehearsal, published 1770, act 1, scene 1, page 12

transverse meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

transverse in Hindi

अनुप्रस्थ, पारवर्ती

transverse in Tamil

குறுக்கீடாகக் செல்லும் தசைநார், குறுக்கான, குறுக்கு, குறுக்கு வாட்ட, குறுக்குநிலை, குறுக்காக

transverse in Urdu

بینڈا, پار کرنا, پیچھے جانا

transverse in Bengali

ট্রান্সভার্স

More languagesFewer languages

transverse in Malayalam: വിലങ്ങനെയുള്ള, കുറുകെയുള്ള, വ്യത്യസ്തമായ, മറിച്ചുള്ള
transverse in Kannada: ಅಡ್ಡ
transverse in Punjabi: ਟ੍ਰਾਂਸਵਰਸ
transverse in Gujarati: ટ્રાન્સવર્સ
transverse in Sanskrit: जिह्म jihma
transverse in Nepali: ट्रान्स्वर्स, अनुप्रस्थ

Examples of transverse in a sentence

Photons at leading order are produced back-to-back with an associated parton with nearly identical transverse momenta.
The transverse process protrudes between the cranial and caudal openings of the foramen transversarium.
The advantage of transverse magnetic polarization, however, is the possibility of exploiting surface plasmons for waveguiding.

All 40 example sentences with transverse

Antonyms of transverse

Forms of transverse

Noun
plural	transverses
Verb
third-person singular present	transverses
present participle	transversing
past participle	transversed
past	transversed

Origin of transverse

Late Middle English, from Latin trānsversus (“turned across; going or lying across or crosswise”). Doublet of transversal.

Phrases with transverse

1 more phrasesFewer phrases

transverse cervical arteries

Words that rhyme with transverse

36 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about transverse

What does transverse mean?: Transverse means situated or lying across; side to side, relative to some defined "forward" direction; perpendicular or slanted relative to the "forward" direction; identified with movement across areas.
What is transverse in Hindi?: Transverse in Hindi is अनुप्रस्थ, पारवर्ती. See Transverse meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is transverse?: Transverse can be an adjective, a noun or a verb.

Words near transverse in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: transverse (page history and authors); transverse (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); transverse (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); transverse (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); transverse (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); transverse (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); transverse (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); transverse (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); transverse (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); transverse (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-transverse.wav.

Cite this entry: “transverse.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/transverse. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.