Penmanships

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The skill or art of writing by hand in an aesthetically pleasing manner
2. The style or quality of one's handwriting, especially in formal contexts
3. The practice of creating legible and elegant handwritten letters, often for artistic purposes

Etymology: "Penmanship" is formed from "pen" and "-manship," and the second part is the more interesting one. "Man" in "-manship" comes from Old English "mann," the same root as modern "man," and the suffix "-ship" descends from an Old English "-sċiepe" that once meant "state, condition, or skill." So a "penmanship" is, literally, the skill or art of the pen-man, the person who writes. The plural "penmanships" is simply the form of "penmanship" used when referring to several distinct styles or kinds of handwriting skill. Because the word is a plain compound built from two English parts, its history is largely a matter of putting those parts together, with the "-ship" suffix carrying the sense of craft or ability that the word still expresses today.

Synonyms: handwritings, calligraphies, scripts, letterings

Antonyms: scribbles, scrawls, illegibility