grawlix
n.— «Mort Walker of “Beetle Bailey” fame invented a cartoon vocabulary called Symbolia that we cartoonists make use of from time to time. According to Mr. Walker, that little set of typographical symbols that stand for obscenities are called “grawlixes.”» —“Tired of wide pages? Grawlixes won’t help” by Debbie Kornmiller Arizona Daily Star (Phoenix) Jan. 29, 2006. (source: Double-Tongued Dictionary)
Further reading
What if, instead of being an inanimate object, a dictionary were alive? That’s the idea behind a lavishly illustrated new children’s book called The Dictionary Story (Bookshop|Amazon) by Oliver Jeffers and Sam Winston. This is part of a...
In the 15th century, the word respair meant “to have hope again.” Although this word fell out of use, it’s among dozens collected in a new book of soothing vocabulary for troubled times. Plus, baseball slang: If a batter...