Crossing

How to spell crossing

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce crossing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does crossing mean?

1. nounA marked place where a road, railway, or river may be crossed.
2. nounA journey across a sea, channel, or other expanse.

Crossing in a sentence

• The children waited at the pedestrian crossing for the light to change.

• The ferry crossing to the island took just under three hours.

• A level crossing blocks the lane whenever a train approaches.

• Rough weather made the channel crossing uncomfortable for every passenger.

Where does crossing come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The base word cross comes ultimately from the Latin crux, meaning a stake or gallows on which people were executed, the same root that gives us 'crucify' and 'crucial'. It entered Old English as 'cros', most likely through Old Irish and Old Norse forms used by early Christian missionaries, originally naming the upright marker of the Christian faith. From the idea of two intersecting lines, the verb 'to cross' developed the sense of moving from one side to the other or of two paths meeting. Adding the native English suffix -ing turned the verb into a noun naming both the action of going across and the physical place where one path cuts over another. The doubled s in the middle simply preserves the spelling of the root cross, which is the detail worth remembering.

How the word is built

• cross (from Latin crux: a cross)
• -ing (noun suffix forming an action or place)