anagram
1 of 2noun
an·a·gram ˈa-nə-ˌgram 
1
: a word or phrase made by transposing the letters of another word or phrase
The word "secure" is an anagram of "rescue."
2
anagrams plural in form but singular in construction : a game in which words are formed by rearranging the letters of other words or by arranging letters taken (as from a stock of cards or blocks) at random
anagrammatic
ˌa-nə-grə-ˈma-tik
adjective or less commonly anagrammatical
ˌa-nə-grə-ˈma-ti-kəl
anagrammatically
ˌa-nə-grə-ˈma-ti-k(ə-)lē
adverb anagram
2 of 2verb
anagrammed; anagramming
transitive verb
1
: anagrammatize
anagrammed the letters of "battle" to form "tablet"
2
: to rearrange (the letters of a text) in order to discover a hidden message
Example Sentences
Recent Examples on the Web
David Fear, Rolling Stone, 20 June 2022 Cravotta's simple anagram game—whose gameplay closely resembled PikPok's popular, pre-existing Four Letters—received a few updates in the months after its release, but then sat untouched and largely unnoticed for years. Kyle Orland, Ars Technica, 5 May 2022 Over time, the boundary between Mira and her character, Irma Vep (an anagram of vampire), begins to blur, as does the line between fiction and reality. Melissa Giannini, ELLE, 18 May 2022 The new material was dubbed spandex, an anagram of expands. Andrew Freeman, Outside Online, 21 May 2012 Turtles can't spell, so Godwin likened the aquarium team's role to that of an anagram solver, simply rearranging. Emma Stein, Detroit Free Press, 18 Mar. 2022 Early on in the pandemic, the New York Times’s Spelling Bee anagram honeycombs were splashed all over on Twitter. Washington Post, 13 Jan. 2022 During the first year of the pandemic, the pair had dived into popular online word games created by the Times, such as Spelling Bee, a daily anagram puzzle, and the paper’s daily crossword. Kyle Chayka, The New Yorker, 20 Jan. 2022 Tellingly, an anagram of all the letters in omicron is moronic. Richard Lederer, San Diego Union-Tribune, 11 Dec. 2021 Washington Post, 13 Feb. 2020 See More
Noun
Much like Cheung’s fish-out-of-water star, Vikander’s Mira (dig that anagram) is caught in a cultural vortex that both excites and confuses her. David Fear, Rolling Stone, 20 June 2022 Cravotta's simple anagram game—whose gameplay closely resembled PikPok's popular, pre-existing Four Letters—received a few updates in the months after its release, but then sat untouched and largely unnoticed for years. Kyle Orland, Ars Technica, 5 May 2022 Over time, the boundary between Mira and her character, Irma Vep (an anagram of vampire), begins to blur, as does the line between fiction and reality. Melissa Giannini, ELLE, 18 May 2022 The new material was dubbed spandex, an anagram of expands. Andrew Freeman, Outside Online, 21 May 2012 Turtles can't spell, so Godwin likened the aquarium team's role to that of an anagram solver, simply rearranging. Emma Stein, Detroit Free Press, 18 Mar. 2022 Early on in the pandemic, the New York Times’s Spelling Bee anagram honeycombs were splashed all over on Twitter. Washington Post, 13 Jan. 2022 During the first year of the pandemic, the pair had dived into popular online word games created by the Times, such as Spelling Bee, a daily anagram puzzle, and the paper’s daily crossword. Kyle Chayka, The New Yorker, 20 Jan. 2022 Tellingly, an anagram of all the letters in omicron is moronic. Richard Lederer, San Diego Union-Tribune, 11 Dec. 2021 Verb
Every time someone joins (several people a week) the Devs commence to anagram the newbie’s name in every which way but the real one — sometimes dozens. Washington Post, 13 Feb. 2020 See More Word History
Etymology
Noun
probably from Middle French anagramme, from New Latin anagrammat-, anagramma, modification of Greek anagrammatismos, from anagrammatizein to transpose letters, from ana- + grammat-, gramma letter — more at gram
Verb
derivative of anagram entry 1
First Known Use
Noun
1589, in the meaning defined at sense 1
Verb
1622, in the meaning defined at sense 1