a person who serves as a professional copyist, especially one who made copies of manuscripts before the invention of printing.
a public clerk or writer, usually one having official status.
Also called sopher, sofer. Judaism. one of the group of Palestinian scholars and teachers of Jewish law and tradition, active from the 5th century b.c. to the 1st century a.d., who transcribed, edited, and interpreted the Bible.
a writer or author, especially a journalist.
a person who copies documents, esp a person who made handwritten copies before the invention of printing
a clerk or public copyist
Old Testament a recognized scholar and teacher of the Jewish Law
Judaism a man qualified to write certain documents in accordance with religious requirements
an author or journalist: used humorously
another name for scriber
1350–1400; Middle English < Latin scrība clerk, derivative of scrībere to write
First recorded in 1670–80; perhaps aphetic form of inscribe
A scribe is a term for someone employed to make written copies of documents. Before printing was invented, the busy scribes in a village would write copies of all the legal documents. As a noun, scribe has several meanings. It's used as an informal term to refer to journalists. Scribe also refers to a sharply pointed tool used for marking wood or metal to be cut. As a verb, it means "to score a line on something with a pointed instrument." The master craftsmen instructed you to scribe a line on the piece of wood where he pointed, to mark the spot where he wanted it cut.
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Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Penner said the work was copied over in Ancient Greek "probably by a student or a somewhat skilful scribe".
From BBC ● Jul. 23, 2026
Or as one scribe put it, the school didn’t want to be dwarfed by “a gigantic breakfast side dish.”
From MarketWatch ● Dec. 12, 2025
The plasticity of digital information is superseding earlier modes of expression and expertise, as the printing press did the scribe.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 5, 2025
The upcoming project is set to hit theaters Nov. 19, 2027, and will reunite original “Gremlins” scribe Chris Columbus with Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Entertainment, which produced the first two “Gremlins” films.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 6, 2025
He motioned Chronicler closer, and the scribe saw he was wearing thick leather gloves.
From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss
Back in California, Scribe is another tech firm that allows companies to automatically create AI user guides.
From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2024
Then we’ll stop by Lady & Larder for a Scribe rosé pinot noir, colorful candles and crackers.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 24, 2024
Call it "Get to the Hed," "Bet Your Hed" or "The Hed-less Scribe."
From Salon ● Feb. 20, 2023
Chris has published reviews of digital journals like the Kindle Scribe, the reMarkable tablet and iPads.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 20, 2023
We knew an old Scribe, it was "once on a time,"— An era to set sober datists despairing;— Then let them despair!
From A Selection from the Works of Frederick Locker by Locker-Lampson, Hannah Jane
Bill Plaschke’s eloquent elegy about Kobe may be the best column he’s ever scribed.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 29, 2021
Petroglyphs, scribed into desert rocks thousands of years ago, alert him to the human pasts of places deemed unpeopled “wastes” by the first white men to apprehend them.
From New York Times ● Jul. 7, 2020
The "apotropaic" marks were scribed into the cave surface as they were thought to keep evil spirits coming from the underworld.
From BBC ● Feb. 14, 2019
Not long ago, I spent a day following Lynden Lee as he scribed at a Massachusetts General Hospital primary-care practice.
From The New Yorker ● Nov. 5, 2018
Note wheel layouts, etc., scribed in the paneling.
From The Borghesi Astronomical Clock in the Museum of History and Technology Contributions from the Museum of History and Technology, Paper 35, the Smithsonian Institution United States National Museum Bulletin 240 by Bedini, Silvio A.
Who is taking care of the patients all those scribing doctors aren’t seeing?
From The New Yorker ● Nov. 5, 2018
I would get John Bradley to start scribing out the entire books that George R.R.
From New York Times ● Aug. 30, 2017
Two decades after that first visit, Magdalen’s 15th-century cloisters, decorated with coats of arms and gargoyles, looked every bit as inspiring as I remembered, though deserted, the scholars no doubt scribing upstairs.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 13, 2016
The important thing is that the Supreme Court has now closed the circle it was scribing with Bilski and Mayo vs.
From Forbes ● Jun. 19, 2014
I said incredulously, thinking of the pale, quiet students who worked in the Archives, sorting, scribing, and fetching books.
From "The Name of the Wind" by Patrick Rothfuss
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.
