Definitions for cross-staffs

cross-staffs cross-staff

Spelling: [kraws-staf, -stahf, kros-]
IPA: /ˈkrɔsˌstæf, -ˌstɑf, ˈkrɒs-/

Cross-Staffs is a 12 letter English word. It's valid Scrabble word worth 7 points. It's valid Words with friends word worth 8 points.

You can make 357 anagrams from letters in cross-staffs (-acfforsssst).

Definitions for cross-staffs

noun

  1. an instrument for measuring the angle of elevation of heavenly bodies, consisting of a calibrated staff with another shorter staff perpendicular to and sliding on it.

Origin of cross-staffs

1400-50, for an earlier sense; late Middle English

Examples for cross-staffs

The cross-staff had not then come into use, and it was never of much service in low latitudes.

But some kind of a dratted cross-current ketched me and I'm sailin' out to sea, I finds, without compass or cross-staff.

A man upon the frame-work controls this wheel, guided by a sight on the frame, and a cross-staff at the end of the field.

He rubbed his eyes, looked again, adjusting his observation by a cross-staff which had been placed so as to bear upon the point.

Iacobs staffean instrument formerly used for measuring the altitude of the sun; a cross-staff.

The vane of a cross-staff, made to slide along it by means of a square socket; it may be set to any of the graduations.

Even the navigators of the fifteenth century were aware of the deficiencies of the cross-staff and sought to improve upon it.

The simplest and crudest form of measurer of which the record has been preserved is known as the cross-staff.

Above, it has the small arc of the Davis quadrant with the sliding rod of the cross-staff below.

Word Value for cross-staffs
Scrable

7

Words with friends

8

Similar words for cross-staffs
Word of the day