Glossary
X-cross
A word that has never appeared in a Dutch newspaper, chosen because the alternative already belonged to the railways.
What is an X-cross?
An X-cross (Dutch: X-kruis) is a person-high frame of two diagonal beams with rings or eyes on them, to which someone is fastened upright with their limbs spread apart. It is the third word Dutch uses for the same piece of furniture: in full it is a St Andrew’s Cross, and on an inventory list, briefly, the cross.
| Full name | St Andrew’s Cross, which carries the saintly origin, the two sides, and the time limit |
| Short in the room | the cross, the word from furnishing lists |
| Where this word appears | on packaging, in web shops, and in secondhand ads |
| Why not andreaskruis | in Dutch that word already belongs to the railway crossing, heraldry, and the liturgy |
| In the newspaper | zero articles with x-kruis, against 1,344 with andreaskruis |
| In the dictionary | the ANW has no entry for andreaskruis and none for x-kruis |
Why Dutch retailers write X-kruis
Because the other word was already taken, and not sparingly either.
The newspaper archive of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek gives 1,344 articles with andreaskruis. They are about unguarded railway crossings, the flag of Scotland and that of Slovakia, the liturgical calendar, crossword puzzles, and wood joints in craft class. Not one is about a piece of play furniture. The oldest that treats it as a warning sign is a report of 4 May 1938 headlined “New Warning System at Unguarded Crossings. THE ‘ANDREAS-KRUIS’ OUTDATED”, about a trial near Raalte with reflective beacons because “a warning sign, the Andreas-kruis, … is in itself already barely noticeable.”
For x-kruis that same archive gives zero articles. Anyone who meets the word today meets it on packaging or in an ad, and that is exactly the point: it is a word without a past, and therefore without a second meaning. The Algemeen Nederlands Woordenboek carries neither, for that matter, which shows how far this whole field lies outside the standard vocabulary.
Why this word is handy
Because you can write it down without explaining what you do not mean.
In an ad, a message, or an inventory list, X-kruis points to exactly one thing. For most Dutch people andreaskruis first calls up a railway crossing, and kruis on its own has four other meanings besides, one of them a body part. What happens at a frame like this and where the time limit lies is on St Andrew’s Cross.
Where this fits on my site
Fastening is on my list of options, light or firm. Whether that happens standing up and for how long is something we decide beforehand; how that conversation goes is on the page about the BDSM date.
Sources
- Newspaper archive of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek (Delpher). Queried through the SRU service, collection DDD_artikel, on 2026-08-10. Provides the ratio between the two words in Dutch newspapers: 1,344 articles with andreaskruis against zero with x-kruis and eight with xkruis, which eight on rereading turn out to be advertisements, a price list, and a church notice, and are therefore OCR flukes. The titles of the first forty hits for andreaskruis were checked: railway crossings, the Union Jack, the Slovak flag, a liturgical calendar, puzzle solutions, and wood joints in craft class, and not one about a piece of play furniture. The oldest that explains the meaning as a warning sign is “New Warning System at Unguarded Crossings. THE ‘ANDREAS-KRUIS’ OUTDATED” of 4 May 1938, about a K.N.A.C. trial at an unguarded crossing on the trunk road from Zwolle to Almelo near Raalte, which states that one finds “only a warning sign, the Andreas-kruis” by the railway and that this sign “is in itself already barely noticeable.” Read word for word from the OCR.
- andreaskruis. Algemeen Nederlands Woordenboek, Instituut voor de Nederlandse Taal. Provides the clean negative control: “sorry, this article is not (yet) in the ANW.” So the dictionary of contemporary Dutch does not carry this word, and x-kruis no more.
Related terms
An X-cross is the same piece of furniture as a St Andrew’s Cross, and that page carries the use, the two sides, and the limit on time.
- St Andrew’s Cross. The same piece of furniture in full, named after the apostle, with the practical use.
- Cross. The short inventory word, with the four other things it means in Dutch.
- Bondage. What fastening someone to this frame falls under, because this is a fixture and nothing more.
- Playroom. The space where you come across this word on an inventory list.
- Dungeon. The heavier version of that same space, where this piece of furniture usually stands at the center.
Frequently asked questions
What people still ask about an X-cross.
What is an X-cross?
An X-cross is a person-high frame of two diagonal beams with rings or eyes on them, to which someone is fastened upright with their limbs spread apart. In full that piece of furniture is a St Andrew’s Cross; on an inventory list it is listed briefly as cross.
Is an X-cross the same as a St Andrew's Cross?
Yes, it is the same piece of furniture under a different name. The trade writes X-kruis because andreaskruis is already taken in Dutch: the newspaper archive of the Koninklijke Bibliotheek gives 1,344 articles for it, about railway crossings, flags, and liturgy, and not one about a piece of play furniture.
Who can you turn to with questions about an X-cross?
Victor, a gigolo with twenty-five years of experience in BDSM and trained as a psychotherapist. Fastening is on his list of options, so you can ask how being fastened upright feels and how long that is responsible. You can do that through the contact form or first chat for free.
Learn more
Still have questions about an X-cross?
I'm Victor. Whether being fastened upright is for you is something you only know once you've felt it, and you can ask me anything about it beforehand. It costs you nothing.
Closing CTA on /term/x-cross, rendered by GlossaryTerm.astro as the last block
on the page. Pairs with the final FAQ item 03-learn-more-about-x-cross.md.
Wording kept distinct from /en/term/st-andrews-cross and /en/term/cross. No
posts.md and no service.md; the reasons are recorded in the frontmatter of
index.md. This body text is never rendered.