Also 6–7 epigramme, (6 epigrame, 7 epigramm). [ad. F. épigramme, ad. L. epigramma, Gr. ἐπίγραμμα, f. ἐπιγράφειν, f. ἐπί upon + γράφειν to write.]
† 1. An inscription, usually in verse; = EPIGRAPH 1.
1552. Huloet, Epigrame or superscription.
1567. Drant, Horace’ Epist., I. vii. D iij. Led by pompe wyth Sergeaunts sad the Epigrammes to graue.
1606. Holland, Sueton., Introd. 4. The Epigramme of the former is extant among the Antiquities of Rome citie.
1699. Bentley, Phal., xviii. 528. The Epigram, that was written upon the public Sepulchre at Athens.
1782. V. Knox, Ess., I. 264. Inscriptions, for such are epigrams according to the original meaning.
a. 1876. M. Collins, in Pen Sketches, I. 246. What the Greeks meant by an epigram was simply an inscription, and its primary use was funereal.
2. A short poem ending in a witty or ingenious turn of thought, to which the rest of the composition is intended to lead up.
1538. Leland, Itin., VI. 59. If it be so I must amend my Epigramme of it.
1607. Topsell, Serpents (1653), 756. Some learned Writers … have compared a Scorpion to an Epigram … because as the sting of the Scorpion lyeth in the tayl, so the force and vertue of an Epigram is in the conclusion.
1876. Green, Short Hist., ix. § 3. 617. Even Rochester in his merciless epigram was forced to own that Charles ‘never said a foolish thing.’
b. loosely used for a laudatory poem.
1872. Ellacombe, Bells of Ch., ix. 493. This epigrame [of date 1558], as it is called, consists of sixty-four lines in English verse in praise of the said Robert Palmer and his sons, and other friends, skilled in ringing changes.
3. A pointed or antithetical saying.
1796. Burke, Regic. Peace, iv. Wks. IX. 51. A short, affected, pedantick, insolent, theatrick laconism: a sort of epigram of contempt.
1884. R. W. Church, Bacon, iii. 59–60. He liked to observe, to generalise in shrewd and sometimes cynical epigrams.
b. Epigrammatic expression.
18[?]. Ld. Brougham, Dk. Bedford, Wks. 1872, I. 393. The morbid taste for slander steeped in epigram.
1877. E. R. Conder, Bas. Faith, i. 35. Epigram is one thing, definition is another.
