sketch

[ skech ]

/ skɛtʃ /

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR sketch ON THESAURUS.COM

noun

a simply or hastily executed drawing or painting, especially a preliminary one, giving the essential features without the details.

a rough design, plan, or draft, as of a book.

a brief or hasty outline of facts, occurrences, etc.: a sketch of his life.

a short, usually descriptive, essay, history, or story.

a short play or slight dramatic performance, as one forming part of a vaudeville program.

verb (used with object)

to make a sketch of.

to set forth in a brief or general account: He sketched his own part in the affair.

Metallurgy. (in a steel mill or the like) to mark (a piece) for cutting.

verb (used without object)

to make a sketch or sketches.

Nearby words

skeptically, skepticism, skerrick, skerry, sket, sketch, sketch book, the, sketch map, sketchable, sketchbook, sketchpad

Origin of sketch

1660–70; < Dutch schets (noun) ≪ Italian schizzo < Latin schedium extemporaneous poem, noun use of neuter of schedius extempore < Greek schédios

SYNONYMS FOR sketch

2 outline.

5 skit, act, routine.

6 draw, outline, design, rough out, delineate, represent.

SEE MORE SYNONYMS FOR sketch ON THESAURUS.COM

Related forms

sketch·er, nounsketch·ing·ly, adverbsketch·like, adjectivere·sketch, verb (used with object)

un·sketched, adjectivewell-sketched, adjective

Synonym study

6. See depict.

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2019

Examples from the Web for sketch

Then they would go to a hotel afterwards and combine the parts they had remembered in one sketch.
The Big Business of Fashion Counterfeits|Lizzie Crocker|December 24, 2014|DAILY BEAST
As for the artist, the great Turner canvases, his watercolors and his sketch books are never allowed to speak.
Why Can’t Movies Capture Genius?|Clive Irving|December 14, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The premise of the sketch was that sex was too spontaneous to be regulated, and the quiz show played that idea to the hilt.
How Antioch College Got Rape Right 20 Years Ago|Nicolaus Mills|December 10, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Even though it was just a line in a sketch, were you like, “I am saying a line in a sketch on SNL?”
How Aidy Bryant Stealthily Became Your Favorite ‘Saturday Night Live’ Star|Kevin Fallon|October 31, 2014|DAILY BEAST

So I wrote that sketch with Chris Kelly and Sarah Schneider.
How Aidy Bryant Stealthily Became Your Favorite ‘Saturday Night Live’ Star|Kevin Fallon|October 31, 2014|DAILY BEAST
The edges of one end are rasped off as shown in the sketch, making a wedged fit into the run.
Elements of Plumbing|Samuel Dibble
The rest of the party had gone to the cliffs with the artist, the girls on a pretense of learning to sketch from nature.
Their Pilgrimage|Charles Dudley Warner
But the one sketch I gave of his manner and matter must serve again and again.
Love Me Little, Love Me Long|Charles Reade
To overcome this I made several blades with teeth as shown in the sketch.
The Boy Mechanic, Book 2|Various
I sent him my own sketch, which he says is in a more kindly spirit; but he is evidently not satisfied with it.
A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria 1837-1852 - (Volume 3 of 3)|Charles C. F. Greville

British Dictionary definitions for sketch

sketch

/ (skɛtʃ) /

noun

a rapid drawing or painting, often a study for subsequent elaboration

a brief usually descriptive and informal essay or other literary composition

a short play, often comic, forming part of a revue

a short evocative piece of instrumental music, esp for piano

any brief outline

verb

to make a rough drawing (of)

(tr often foll by out) to make a brief description of

Derived Forms

sketchable, adjectivesketcher, noun

Word Origin for sketch

C17: from Dutch schets, via Italian from Latin schedius hastily made, from Greek skhedios unprepared

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012