I do not follow the meaning of "on the wax" below, and do not find its usage in any online dictionary. Yet the original text appears in Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, thus peer-reviewed. So I suppose the usage is correct. Can anyone clarify the meaning of "on the wax"?
The Sophist and Statesman are late Platonic dialogues, whose relative dates are established by their stylistic similarity to the Laws, a work that was apparently still “on the wax” at the time of Plato's death (Diogenes Laertius 3.37)
Best Answer
This is obviously a reference to the wax tablets that were used for drafts and note-taking before the invention of paper; after you had made a fair copy onto a roll of papyrus, you could simply smooth over the wax tablet and re-use it. Nowadays we would probably say 'in manuscript', but in ancient times, of course, all writing was in manuscript, so apparently the Stanford author thought this would be a clever alternative.