Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • adjective Of or having the nature of an epigram.
  • adjective Containing or given to the use of epigrams.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • Dealing in epigrams; speaking or writing in epigram: as, an epigrammatic poet.
  • Suitable to epigrams; belonging to epigrams; having the quality of an epigram; antithetical; pointed: as, epigrammatic style or wit.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • Writing epigrams; dealing in epigrams.
  • Suitable to epigrams; belonging to epigrams; like an epigram; pointed; piquant.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective having the characteristics of an epigram
  • adjective containing or using epigrams

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • adjective terse and witty and like a maxim

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Latin epigrammaticus, from Greek epigramma, epigrammat-, epigram; see epigram.]

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Examples

  • Heretofore Biblical writers have given to us battles, laws, histories, songs; now we have in Solomon's writings a new style in short, epigrammatic sentences.

    The Woman's Bible Elizabeth Cady Stanton 1858

  • This is the deeper meaning behind the epigrammatic phrase of the novel and film--"Who is John Galt?"

    Michael Shermer: Atlas Shrugged, But You Shouldn't Michael Shermer 2011

  • She was herself a humorist -- writing entertaining light verses -- and a vivacious talker 'uniting,' it was said, 'strong common sense with a lively imagination' and a crisp epigrammatic phrase ....

    Archive 2009-03-01 Linda 2009

  • She was herself a humorist -- writing entertaining light verses -- and a vivacious talker 'uniting,' it was said, 'strong common sense with a lively imagination' and a crisp epigrammatic phrase ....

    It Was a Cheerful Home at the Austens' Linda 2009

  • If I had Bill Bryson's wit and epigrammatic suavity and his ability to make each datum ripple seamlessly into the next.

    Book review: 'At Home' by Bill Bryson Louis Bayard 2010

  • He was quite as able to be terse and memorable when in conversation and, like Oscar Wilde (who was, like him, disconcertingly vast when seen at close quarters), seems seldom to have been off duty when it came to the epigrammatic and aphoristic.

    Demons and Dictionaries 2009

  • But it is an elegy with no tears, only a clear-headed acknowledgment that, in the novel's most famous epigrammatic nugget of wisdom, "If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change."

    A Lyric, Elegiac Lament for a Lost World Willard Spiegelman 2011

  • This is the deeper meaning behind the epigrammatic phrase of the novel and film--"Who is John Galt?"

    Michael Shermer: Atlas Shrugged, But You Shouldn't Michael Shermer 2011

  • He was quite as able to be terse and memorable when in conversation and, like Oscar Wilde (who was, like him, disconcertingly vast when seen at close quarters), seems seldom to have been off duty when it came to the epigrammatic and aphoristic.

    Demons and Dictionaries 2009

  • If I had Bill Bryson's wit and epigrammatic suavity and his ability to make each datum ripple seamlessly into the next.

    Book review: 'At Home' by Bill Bryson Louis Bayard 2010

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