text
Pluraltexts (some meanings)
Pluraltexts (some meanings)
- 1Words or other characters in written form, in general and in any amount, as opposed to pictures or speech.
Scholars studied the text engraved on the temple walls.
The editor reviewed the entire text for errors before publication.
UsageFor written material in general use no article: a page of text, add some text. A text is one piece of writing.
- 2Ellipsis of text message.
She fired off a quick text before the meeting started.
His phone buzzed with a text from an unknown number.
UsageUsually send someone a text or get a text from someone; the verb works too: text me.
Note
A clipping that now stands on its own: the compound text message dropped its second word in everyday talk. Amy Winehouse was already rhyming it with vexed and next on her 2003 debut album, Frank.
- 3To send a written message to someone by phone, or to exchange such messages.
I'll text you the address once I find the invitation.
He texted his boss to say he would be late for the meeting.
UsageThe object can be the person or the message: text me, text me the address, text it to me. The past form is texted.
- 4
- 5The principal written content of a book or document, as distinguished from its illustrations, notes, appendices and similar added material.
The footnotes run almost as long as the text itself.
The designer wrapped the text around the photographs so each page felt balanced.
UsageUsually the text: a point made in the text rather than in a note.
Similarcopy
Note
Editors and designers set the text against everything around it: footnotes, illustrations, captions, appendices. A point made in the text belongs to the argument proper, while one made in a note is an aside, so writers say a matter is discussed in the text or relegated to a note. In page layout the text is the block that pictures and margins are arranged around.
- 6Digital data that can be interpreted and displayed as human-readable characters rather than as binary or image formats.
The program converts each document into searchable text before indexing it.
Plain text contains no formatting at all, only the characters themselves.
UsageCommon in plain text, a text file and text data, set against binary.
Oppositebinary
Note
Programmers set text against binary. A text file holds characters a person can read directly, while binary data is meant for machines to interpret. Plain text goes further and strips away all formatting, leaving only the characters themselves.
- 7A verse or passage from the Bible, particularly one that a sermon is based on or that is cited to prove a doctrine.
The minister announced his text and began to preach.
Before the sermon, the minister announced his text, a single verse from the Psalms.
Similarpassage, verse, scripture
Note
Here the word stays close to its church roots: Medieval Latin textus already meant "the Scriptures" before English borrowed it. A preacher announces a text and expounds it, and a disputant cites one as proof. The scale is a verse or passage, not a whole volume, the opposite end from the book-length meaning.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Medieval Latin textus meant 'the Scriptures' before the word passed into English. en.wiktionary.org
- English text derives from Medieval Latin textus. en.wiktionary.org
Less common meanings
- 8The topic around which a speech, argument, or piece of writing is developed.
With the city's housing shortage as his text, the speaker spent forty minutes arguing for cheaper rents.
He took poverty as his text and spoke for nearly an hour.
UsageUsually in take something as one's text: he took poverty as his text.
Note
A pulpit word carried into the lecture hall and the novel. Once a sermon could be built on a verse, any speech or book could be built on a subject. Topic and theme are its plain synonyms, but text keeps a trace of the sermon passage and suggests a subject to be expounded at length.
- 9To write in large characters, as in a formal large hand.
I wish / (Next to my part of Heav'n) that she would spend / The last part of her life so here, that all / Indifferent judges might condemn me for / A most malicious slanderer, nay, text it / Upon my forehead
1607, Phillip Massinger, Beaumont and FletcherNote
An old verb from the scribe's desk, tied to the large text hand: to text something was to letter it big and bold. In The Tragedy of Thierry and Theodoret (1621), by Fletcher and his collaborators, a speaker wishes impartial judges would brand him a slanderer and "text it / Upon my forehead," displaying the charge for all to see.
- 10A large style of handwriting, or a printing typeface such as black letter.
Showing meanings only.
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Origin
It comes from Middle English text, from Old French texte, from Medieval Latin textus ("the Scriptures, text, treatise"), from Latin textus ("the style or texture of a work"), a noun formed from texō ("I weave"). It is related to English texture.