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
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Are there words and phrases that you misunderstood for an embarrassingly long time? Maybe you thought that money laundering literally meant washing drug-laced dollar bills, or that AM radio stations only broadcast in the morning? • A moving new...