acrostic
Part of speech: noun
adj
Morphological type: simple
Etymology: Borrowed from Middle French acrostiche, acrostique (“acrostic”) (modern French acrostiche), and its etymon Late Latin acrostichis, from Ancient Greek ἀκροστιχίς (akrostikhís), from ἄκρο- (ákro-, prefix indicating, among other things, the extremity or tip of something) + στῐ́χος (stĭ́khos, “row or file of soldiers; line of poetry, verse”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *steygʰ- (“to climb, go”)).
Inflected forms:
form: acrostics
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: acrostick
pos: noun
tags: alternative
form: acrosticke
pos: noun
tags: alternative
form: more acrostic
pos: adj
tags: comparative
form: most acrostic
pos: adj
tags: superlative
form: acrostick
pos: adj
tags: alternative
form: acrosticke
pos: adj
tags: alternative
Senses:
gloss: A poem or other text in which certain letters, often the first in each line, spell out a name or message.
pos: noun
tags: also
attributive
examples: He [Judas Maccabeus] was termed Mackabæus, becauſe he carried in his ſtandard, or vexillum militare, theſe four Hebrew letters, Mem, Chaph, Beth, and Jod, or M. C. B. and J. whereunto their points being added, which are their vowells, (for others they have none) his mott was Mackabai, whereof he took his name. Theſe four letters are the acroſtickes or initiall letters of theſe four wordes in the fifteenth chapter of the book of Exodus, Mi Chamocha Baalim Jehovah, which is in Latin Quis ſicut tu Deorum Jehova? ["Who among the gods is like you, O Adonai?", Exodus 15:11.]
I have written an acroſticke ſonet to his Maieſtie, a canzonet to the Queene, and another acroſticke unto the Prince; whoſe ſervant I am by vow, and ſubordinate ſubject by birth.
[L]et him that is melancholy […] apply his minde I ſay to Heraldry, Antiquity, invent Impreſſes, Emblemes; make Epithalamiums, Epitaphs, Elegies, Epigrams, Palindrona Epigrammata, Anagrams, Chronograms, Acroſticks, upon his friends names; […]
And afterwards gives as many reaſons for it, as there are letters in Hibernaculum Ciconiarum, and that too in the Acrostick way, each ſentence beginning with a letter of thoſe words, according to their order.
There is a most crying dullness on both sides. I have seen tory acrostics and whig anagrams, and do not quarrel with either of them, because they are whigs or tories, but because they are anagrams and acrostics.
But ſhould this Method fail, recourſe might be had to others more effectual, by Learned Men called Acroſticks and Anagrams. Firſt, might be found Men of Skill and Penetration who can diſcern that all initial Letters have political Meanings.
No Crambo, no Acrostic fine, / Great letters lacing down each line; / No ſtrange Conundrum, no invention / Beyond the reach of comprehenſion, / [...] / Shall ſtrive to pleaſe you, at th' expence / Of ſimple taſte, and common ſenſe.
On this monument is a long epitaph in verse, which is printed in Prince's Worthies. It is an acrostic, the first letters of each line forming the words "Oliver Hill of Shilston."
I became a contributor to things monthly. I produced charade upon charade, rebus upon rebus, and acrostick upon acrostick, to the admiration of every body except my parents. Poor people! they were devoid of taste, and knew not the value of such a son.
Both poems, which were signed with pseudonyms, were acrostics, the initial letters spelling out a 'case.' 'Case' meant 'romance,' a formal coupling of two boys' names, with the name of the elder boy first. [...] But nothing much would have come of it had not another of the sixth-form members of the Poetry Society been in love with one of the smaller boys whose names appeared in the acrostics. In rage and jealousy he went to the headmaster and called his attention to the acrostic – which otherwise neither he nor any other of the masters would have noticed.
A more general form of manipulation of linguistic signs is the acrostic, a set of verses (or words) whose initial letters form a word, phrase or even a sentence. The acrostic constituted a common feature of Egyptian texts as well as forming an important element in the Old Testament [...].
Acrostics and acronyms are examples of mnemonic devices. [...] Please Excuse My Dear Aunt Sally (PEMDAS), has become the most well-known acrostic for helping students remember the order of operations when solving an algebraic equation. The acrostic reminds students to start by solving inside the parentheses, then simplifying the exponents, next multiplying or dividing (whichever comes first when looking from left to right), then finally adding or subtracting (whichever comes first from left to right).
gloss: A poem in Hebrew in which successive lines or verses start with consecutive letters of the alphabet.
pos: noun
tags: also
attributive
examples: The Whole [of the Book of Zephaniah] is wrote in a very lively, tender, and pathetic Stile; and all the Chapters, except the laſt, (which ſeems to have been of later Compoſition than the reſt) are in Acroſtick Verſe, i.e. every Line, or Couplet, begins, in an Alphabetical Order, with ſome Letter in the Hebrew Alphabet.
Each of the five chapters of the Lamentations contains a distinct elegy, according to the number of letters in the Hebrew alphabet. And in the first four chapters the versification resembles acrostics. In the three first chapters each verse consists of three lines, and the initial letters of each verse are in the order of the Hebrew alphabet, with the exception that i. 7, and ii. 19, consist of five lines.
The psalm is an individual thanksgiving that publicizes the psalmist as an encouragement for all who struggle to remain loyal to their God. It is in acrostic form in which every line begins with a successive letter of the twenty-two letter Hebrew alphabet. […] The acrostic form perhaps explains why the specificity one expects in a thanksgiving is diluted.
gloss: A kind of word puzzle, whose solution forms an anagram of a quotation, with its initial letters often forming the name of the person quoted.
pos: noun
tags: also
attributive
examples: those who rack their brains in solving the Acrostics in our Sunday papers will, perchance, be saved many a rack and many a failure by our reverse alphabetical arrangement
For those of you who are new to acrostics, here is what to do. Your goal is to figure out the quote in the grid. […] Reading down the first letter of each answer spells the name of the author and the title of the work from which the quote was taken.
gloss: A kind of word puzzle in which a series of words are clued, and individual letters from the clued word spell out one or more additional words.
pos: noun
tags: also
attributive
gloss: Of or pertaining to acrostics.
pos: adj
tags: also
attributive
examples: Other ancients have suggested that the original verses were written in hieroglyphs and also mentioned the acrostic code.
Derived words: acrostically
acrosticism
double acrostic
nonacrostic
paracrostic
pentacrostic
triple acrostic
Translations: