Cross

How to spell cross

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce cross

What does cross mean?

1. verbTo move or travel from one side of something to the other.
2. nounA mark or shape made of two intersecting lines, often used as a symbol or to indicate a spot.
3. adjectiveAnnoyed or moderately angry.

Cross in a sentence

• verb

  Pedestrians should cross at the marked junction.

• noun

  She drew a small cross beside each completed task.

• adjective

  The manager was cross about the missed deadline.

• verb

  The ferry takes an hour to cross the channel.

• noun

  A stone cross stood at the centre of the old churchyard.

• adjective

  She felt cross when the meeting overran again.

Where does cross come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word traces back to the Latin crux, which literally named the wooden stake or gibbet on which the Romans executed criminals. As Christianity spread, crux came to refer specifically to the structure on which Jesus was crucified, and the word carried deep religious weight from that point on. It reached English by more than one route: an early form arrived through Old Irish cros, and the shape eventually overtook the older native English word 'rood'. By the medieval period the noun had branched into verbs and adjectives, since marking with a cross, moving from one side to another (crossing), and being thwarted or 'crossed' all grew naturally from the same image of two intersecting lines. The familiar 'ss' ending simply reflects the short vowel and the way English doubled the consonant; the same crux root also gives us 'crucial', 'crucify', and 'crusade'.

How the word is built

• cross (from Latin crux: a stake or gibbet)