Writing

How to spell writing

7 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce writing

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does writing mean?

1. nounWritten words considered as a body of text, or the activity of producing them.
2. verbThe present participle of write: in the act of forming letters or composing text.

Writing in a sentence

• noun

  Her writing filled three notebooks by the end of the project.

• verb

  She was writing a report when the power went out.

• noun

  He earns a living from writing rather than from teaching.

• verb

  He kept writing until the last seat on the train was taken.

Where does writing come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends from the Old English verb writan, which originally meant 'to scratch, score, or draw the outline of' something. That literal sense reflects how early Germanic peoples produced text: by carving runes into wood, bone, or stone rather than putting ink on a page. As parchment and ink became common, the meaning narrowed to the act of forming letters and words. The verbal noun 'writing' was built by adding the -ing ending to the verb, a pattern that has been productive in English for over a thousand years. The silent w at the front is a relic of an old Germanic consonant cluster (wr-) that was once fully pronounced, and that same fossil w is exactly the trap that catches writers today; it is also why a single t survives here, unlike the doubled t of 'written'.

How the word is built

• writ- (from Old English writan: to write, scratch, draw)
• -ing (forming a verbal noun or present participle)