cacography
/kəˈkɒɡrəfi
/noun [mass noun] archaic
Bad handwriting or spelling.‘We have a national affliction, and it's called cacography - that means ‘illegible handwriting.’...
- He blows off his steam with such an eagerness that he forgets for a time, or nearly forgets, his cacography.
- And yet, upon careful examination we find a method, a system, in his orthography, or rather in his cacography.
Derivatives
cacographer
- I need to know if there are any cacographers strong enough to write the misspell that infected her.
- I am a cacographer, though both of my uncle and aunt are calligraphers, and my mother is a painting teacher.
- The police chief, the owner of the laundromat, half of the samba band, the entire municipal council, the town floozy - they were all nematodes: roundworms, hookworms, pinworms, whipworms and cacographers.
Origin
Late 16th century: from Greek kakos 'bad', on the pattern of orthography.