This paper describes an on-line handwritten Japanese text recognition method that is liberated from constraints on writing direction (line direction) and character orientation. This method estimates the line direction and character orientation using the time sequence information of pen-tip coordinates and employs writing-box- free recognition with context processing combined. The method can cope with a mixture of vertical, horizontal and skewed lines with arbitrary character orientations. It is expected useful for tablet PC's, interactive electronic whiteboards and so on.