Boustrophedon

3 definitions found

From The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48 [gcide]:

  Boustrophedon \Bou`stro*phe"don\, n. [Gr. ? turning like oxen in
     plowing; ? to turn.]
     An ancient mode of writing, in alternate directions, one line
     from left to right, and the next from right to left (as
     fields are plowed), as in early Greek and Hittite.
     [1913 Webster]



From WordNet (r) 2.0 [wn]:

  boustrophedon
       n : an ancient writing system: having alternate lines written in
           opposite directions; literally `as the ox ploughs'

From Jargon File (4.3.1, 29 Jun 2001) [jargon]:

  boustrophedon n. [from a Greek word for turning like an ox while
     plowing] An ancient method of writing using alternate left-to-right and
     right-to-left lines. This term is actually philologists' techspeak and
     typesetters' jargon. Erudite hackers use it for an optimization
     performed by some computer typesetting software and moving-head
     printers. The adverbial form `boustrophedonically' is also found
     (hackers purely love constructions like this).