Editing Crossword (section)

== Non-English languages ==
{{Original research section|date=July 2021}}
Owing to the large number of words ending with a vowel, Italian crossword-makers have perhaps the most difficult task. The right margin and the bottom can be particularly difficult to put together. From such a perspective, Swedish crossword-makers have a far easier task. Especially in the large picture crosswords, both conjugation of verbs and declension of adjectives and nouns are allowed. A Swedish clue like ''"kan sättas i munnen" = "sked"'' ("can be put in the mouth" = "spoon") can be grammatically changed; ''"<u>den</u> kan sättas i munnen" = "skeden"'' ("<u>it</u> can be put in the mouth" = "the spoon"), as the definite form of a noun includes declension.

=== Orthography ===
{{more citations needed section|date=November 2020}}
From their origin in New York, crosswords have spread to many countries and languages. In languages other than English, the status of diacritics varies according to the orthography of the particular language, thus:
* in [[Afrikaans language|Afrikaans]] all diacritical markings are ignored. Words such as ''TEË'' (meaning opposed) and ''TEE'' (meaning tea) are both simply written ''TEE''. The same goes for ''SÊ'' (say) and ''SE'' (belonging to) and many others.
* in [[Czech language|Czech]] and [[Slovak language|Slovak]], diacritics are respected and ''[[Ch (digraph)|ch]]'', being considered one letter, occupies one square.
* in [[Dutch language|Dutch]] crosswords, the ''[[IJ (letter)|ij]]'' [[digraph (orthography)|digraph]] is considered one letter, filling one square, and the ''IJ'' and the ''Y'' (see [[Dutch alphabet]]) are considered distinct. Rules may vary in other word games.
* in [[Esperanto language|Esperanto]] crosswords, diacritics are respected, as they form separate letters (graphemes).<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.semajnodeenigmoj.com/|title=Home|website=www.semajnodeenigmoj.com|access-date=25 March 2018|archive-date=20 April 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220420015740/http://www.semajnodeenigmoj.com/|url-status=usurped}}</ref>
*  in [[French language|French]], in [[Spanish language|Spanish]] and in [[Italian language|Italian]], accent marks and most other diacritical markings are ignored, except the [[tilde]] in Spanish: for instance, in French, the final ''E'' of answer ''ÊTRE'' can double as the final ''É'' of ''CONGÉ'' when written ''ETRE'' and ''CONGE''; but in Spanish, N and [[Ñ]] are distinct letters.
* In [[West Frisian language|Frisian]] diacritics are fully respected.
* in [[German language]] crosswords, the [[Germanic umlaut|umlauts]] ''ä'', ''ö'', and ''ü'' are dissolved into ''ae'', ''oe'', and ''ue'', and ''[[ß]]'' is dissolved into ''ss''.
* in [[Hungarian language|Hungarian]], diacritics are either fully respected, or not respected where they denote length: that is ''I/Í'', ''O/Ó'', ''Ö/Ő'', ''U/Ú'', ''Ü/Ű'' are considered the same, but not ''A/Á'' and ''E/É'' which mark different sounds; although the difference between the short/long pairs of letters is a distinctive feature in Hungarian. Digraphs fill two squares.
* in [[Irish language|Irish]] crosswords, the accents on ''Á É Í Ó Ú'' are all respected, so (for example) the ''Í'' in ''SÍB'' cannot double as the ''I'' in ''SLIABH''.
* in [[Latin language|Latin]], diacritics are ignored. Therefore, ''A'' is considered the same as ''Ă'' or ''Ā''. [[Ecclesiastical Latin]] is normally used. See the monthly magazine of Latin crosswords ''[[Hebdomada Aenigmatum]]'' as a reference.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.latincrosswords.com/|title=Latin crosswords – Cruciverba in latino – Aenigmata latina|website=Latincrosswords.com}}</ref>
* in [[Portuguese language|Portuguese]], diacritics are ignored with the exception of ''Ç''. Therefore, ''A'' could be checked with ''Ã'' or ''Á''.
* in [[Romanian language|Romanian]], diacritics are ignored.
* in [[Russian language|Russian]], ''Ё'' doubles as ''Е'' but ''Й'' is considered different from ''И''; the soft sign ''Ь'' and the hard sign ''Ъ'' occupy a separate square, different from that of the previous letter.
* in [[Spanish language|Spanish]] crosswords, the digraphs ''[[Ch (digraph)|ch]]'' and ''[[ll]]'' fill two squares, although in some old crosswords (from prior to the 1996 spelling reform) they filled one square.

{{See also|Digraph (orthography)#Digraphs versus letters||Diacritic}}

=== Grid design, clues, and conventions ===
<gallery>
Image:CrosswordJPN.svg|Japanese-style
Image:Schwedenrätsel.jpg|Swedish-style
Image:BarredGridCrossword.jpg|Barred grid where bold bars are used instead of shaded blocks to separate the words
File:Bengalicrossword.jpg|A [[Bengali language|Bengali]] crossword grid
File:Ristikontekoa.jpg|Person solving a Finnish crossword puzzle
</gallery>

French-language crosswords are smaller than English-language ones, and not necessarily square: there are usually 8–13 rows and columns, totaling 81–130 squares. They need not be symmetric and two-letter words are allowed, unlike in most English-language puzzles. Compilers strive to minimize use of shaded squares. A black-square usage of 10% is typical; [[Georges Perec]] compiled many 9×9 grids for [[Le Point]] with four or even three black squares.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://homepage.urbanet.ch/cruci.com/textes/histoire6.htm |title=Histoire des mots croisés. Chapitre VI |publisher=Homepage.urbanet.ch |access-date=2013-11-26 |archive-date=2014-04-24 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140424053129/http://homepage.urbanet.ch/cruci.com/textes/histoire6.htm |url-status=dead }}</ref> Rather than numbering the individual clues, the rows and columns are numbered as on a [[chessboard]]. All clues for a given row or column are listed, against its number, as separate sentences.

In [[Italy]], crosswords are usually oblong and larger than French ones, 13×21 being a common size. As in France, they usually are not symmetrical; two-letter words are allowed; and the number of shaded squares is minimized. Nouns (including surnames) and the infinitive or past participle of verbs are allowed, as are abbreviations; in larger crosswords, it is customary to put at the center of the grid phrases made of two to four words, or forenames and surnames. A variant of Italian crosswords does not use shaded squares: words are delimited by thickening the grid. Another variant starts with a blank grid: the solver must insert both the answers and the shaded squares, and across and down clues are either ordered by row and column or not ordered at all.

Modern [[Modern Hebrew|Hebrew]] is normally written with only the consonants; vowels are either understood, or entered as diacritical marks. This can lead to ambiguities in the entry of some words, and compilers generally specify that answers are to be entered in [[ktiv male]] (with some vowels) or [[ktiv haser]] (without vowels). Further, since Hebrew is written from right to left, but Roman numerals are used and written from left to right, there can be an ambiguity in the description of lengths of entries, particularly for multi-word phrases. Different compilers and publications use differing conventions for both of these issues.

In the [[Japanese language]] crossword; because of the writing system, one syllable (typically [[katakana]]) is entered into each white cell of the grid rather than one letter, resulting in the typical solving grid seeming small in comparison to those of other languages. Any second [[Yōon]] character is treated as a full syllable and is rarely written with a smaller character. Even cipher crosswords have a Japanese equivalent, although pangrammaticity does not apply. Crosswords with [[kanji]] to fill in are also produced, but in far smaller number as it takes far more effort to construct one. Despite Japanese having three writing forms - [[hiragana]], [[katakana]], and [[kanji]] - they are rarely mixed in a single crossword puzzle. The design of Japanese crossword grids often follows two additional rules: that shaded cells may not share a side (i.e. they may not be orthogonally contiguous) and that the corner squares must be white.

[[A. N. Prahlada Rao]], based in [[Bangalore]], has composed/ constructed some 35,000 crossword puzzles in the language [[Kannada language|Kannada]], including 7,500 crosswords based on films made in Kannada, with a total of 10,00,000 (ten lakhs, or one million) clues.<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.thehindubusinessline.in/2001/05/14/stories/101444g3.htm |title=Making clues |publisher=Thehindubusinessline.in |date=2001-05-14 |access-date=2013-11-26}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.vijaykarnatakaepaper.com/Details.aspx?id=6041&boxid=1222762|title=Details|website=www.vijaykarnatakaepaper.com}}</ref> His name was recorded in the Limca Book Of Records in 2015 for creating the highest number of crosswords in any Indian Regional Language. He continued to hold this title through 2016 and 2017.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.coca-colaindia.com/stories/most-crosswords-created--regional-language-|title=Limca Book of Records|website=www.limcabookofrecords.in}}</ref> In 2008, a five volume set of his puzzles was released, followed by 7 more volumes in 2017.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/17/stories/2008021753500400.htm |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090724083952/http://www.hindu.com/2008/02/17/stories/2008021753500400.htm |url-status=dead |archive-date=2009-07-24 |title=Karnataka / Bangalore News : Kannada crossword puzzles launched |date=2008-02-17 |newspaper=[[The Hindu]] |access-date=2013-11-26}}</ref> [[Bengali language|Bengali]] is also well known for its crossword puzzles. Crosswords are published regularly in most [[Bengali language|Bengali]] dailies and periodicals. The grid system is similar to the British style and two-letter words are usually not allowed.

In [[Poland]], crosswords typically use British-style grids, but some do not have shaded cells. Shaded cells are often replaced by boxes with clues—such crosswords are called Swedish puzzles or Swedish-style crosswords. In a vast majority of Polish crosswords, nouns are the only allowed words.

Swedish crosswords are mainly in the illustrated (photos or drawings), in-line clue style typical of the "Swedish-style grid". The "Swedish-style" grid (picture crosswords) uses no clue numbers. Instead, clues are contained in the cells which do not contain answers, with arrows indicating where and in what direction to fill in answers. Arrows can be omitted from clue cells, in which case the convention is for the answer to go horizontally to the right of the clue cell, or – if the clue cell is split vertically and contains two clues – for the answer to go horizontally to the right for the top clue and vertically below for the bottom clue. This style of grid is also used in several countries other than Sweden, often in magazines, but also in daily newspapers. The grid often has one or more photos replacing a block of squares as a clue to one or several answers; for example, the name of a pop star, or some kind of rhyme or phrase that can be associated with the photo. These puzzles usually have no symmetry in the grid but instead often have a common theme (literature, music, nature, geography, events of a special year, etc.) This tradition prospered already in the mid-1900s, in family magazines and sections of newspapers. Then the specialised magazines took off. Around the turn of the millennium, approximately half a dozen Swedish magazine publishers produced specialised crossword magazines, totaling more than twenty titles, often published on a monthly basis. The oldest extant crossword magazine published in Swedish is ''Krysset''<ref>[http://krysset.se/Corpbiz/1164/ "Krysset – klassikern med kvalitet och kunskap"]. Krysset.se. Retrieved 2012-01-04. {{in lang|sv}}</ref> (from [[Bonnier Group|Bonnier]]), founded in 1957. Additionally, nearly all newspapers publish crosswords of some kind, and at weekends often devote specialised sections in the paper to crosswords and similar type of pastime material. Both major evening dailies (''[[Aftonbladet]]'' and ''[[Expressen]]'') publish a weekly crossword supplement, named ''Kryss & Quiz'' and ''Korsord''<ref>[http://www.expressen.se/omexpressen/1.2460276/dagens-bilaga-med-expressen-korsord "Dagens bilaga med Expressen – Korsord"]. Expressen.se. Retrieved 2012-01-04. {{in lang|sv}}</ref> respectively. Both are available as paid supplements on Mondays and Tuesdays, as part of the ongoing competition between the two newspapers.