The most common and most likely answer to this crossword clue is the 4 plus 5 letter word SANS SERIF
I've seen this crossword clue in The Guardian
S
A
N
S
S
E
R
I
F
More clues leading to the result SANS SERIF
- Type of soldiers carrying indefinite number of sacks around
- Type more practical if saints are included
- Sack Susan, oddly regarded as revolutionary type
- Leader of society wants fairness organised without any frills
- In fairness, hapless son is not an ostentatious type
- Secretary’s initial answer’s to get rid of raised typeface
- Typical sort of characters, as in ‘serfs’, maybe
- Type of soldiers covering partners with return fire
- ‘Ass’ infers stupid type
Buddy explains!
The straight part
We know that "Typical sort of characters" is the straight/definition part of the clue. The straight part is often a synonym or definition, in this case typical sort of characters = sans serif.The cryptic/wordplay part
In cryptic crossword there's often an wordplay/cryptic part as well.This part involves a more complex hint, such as an anagram, homophone, hidden word, etc.
Sadly, We don't have an explanation for this specific crossword clue yet.
What does SANS SERIF mean?
SANS SERIF noun- A typeface in which the characters do not have serifs.