calligraphy
Americannoun
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fancy penmanship, especially highly decorative handwriting, as with a great many flourishes.
She appreciated the calligraphy of the 18th century.
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handwriting; penmanship.
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the art of writing beautifully.
He studied calligraphy when he was a young man.
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a script, usually cursive, although sometimes angular, produced chiefly by brush, especially Chinese, Japanese, or Arabic writing of high aesthetic value.
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Fine Arts. line or a group of lines either derived from or resembling letter forms and characterized by qualities usually associated with cursive writing, especially that produced with a brush or pen.
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of calligraphy
First recorded in 1605–15, calligraphy is from the Greek word kalligraphía beautiful writing. See calli-, -graphy
Explanation
Ever see a framed diploma in your doctor's office filled with fancy old fashioned curvy handwriting announcing they trained at such and such a university? Well, that style of writing is calligraphy, and it's mostly used for important public documents. The word calligraphy comes from two Greek words stuck together, kallos, meaning "beauty," and graphein, meaning "to write" — literally "beautiful writing." In the days before printing was invented, all books and documents were written by hand using calligraphy, the most famous examples being the bibles written by medieval monks.
Vocabulary lists containing calligraphy
Write On!: Graph and Gram
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East Asia - Middle School
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East Asia - Introductory
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
It looked disorientingly familiar to a fellow Egyptian American: Art from Egypt lined the walls, with brass pieces and calligraphy you’d find in a Cairo bazaar.
From Slate • Apr. 29, 2026
The one that really moved me was an ancient Chinese calligraphy example that’s from 1000 B.C.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 21, 2026
To illustrate, she holds up a box of charred scraps covered in Arabic calligraphy.
From BBC • Dec. 4, 2025
Kurosawa insisted on mixing black calligraphy ink with the water in the rain machines, to ensure that the deluge could be distinguished from the cloudy sky behind it.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 17, 2025
His writing was beautiful and powerful, and the lively and vigorous flourishes in his calligraphy awed us.
From "Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution" by Ji-li Jiang
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
