{"id":24694,"date":"2026-07-29T19:46:28","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T19:46:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24694"},"modified":"2026-07-29T19:46:29","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T19:46:29","slug":"griffonage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24694","title":{"rendered":"Griffonage"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What do <strong>griffons<\/strong> have to do with messy writing? Let&#8217;s find out. <\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/smallcurio\/30784005737\/in\/photolist-NUh5pB-2j34iAi-8xTPJW-63rGwG-2qyRz1H-63rKdd-4tsST-63rJRU-2oEcr4W-PJEMe-21xdUG-MYaL9E-xzpBwv-2n3yWhU-2iRPeL6-i7GMES-8xTUpw-21vXDt-8xTTBq-21v59X-2n3yQzG-2ndWD29-xwtWYG-xhchh1-wBMbfy-2nQdadF-8xQWB6-4UV8eH-8xQPEx-ryHtkp-6WcGu7-2ipyncp-8xTULY-8DXu2M-6YNyN1-8xTSvG-5VMKdb-8E1BgC-6YNyME-2otrNXt-2ngDNvr-5BYENP-5FBS3n-8E1ANm-8E1Af5-8uvxHD-8E1BZf-8DXscX-j5DXSo-5uCqd\" title=\"Griffin\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/1932\/30784005737_bedd4f587c_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"457\" alt=\"Griffin\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><strong>Griffonage<\/strong> [\u02c8\u0261r\u026af\u0259\u02ccn\u0251\u02d0\u0292] is a rarely-used word that means careless handwriting or a crude or illegible scrawl. It comes from the French word <strong>griffonner<\/strong> (to scribble, scrawl), from <strong>griffer<\/strong> (to scratch), from Old French <em>grifer<\/em>, from <em>griffe<\/em> (claw, talon), from Old High German <em>gr\u012bfan<\/em> (to grab, grasp, gripe), from Proto-Germanic <em>*gr\u012bpan\u0105<\/em> (to grab, grasp), from PIE <em>*g\u02b0reyb-<\/em> (to grab, grasp) [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/griffonage\">source<\/a>]. <\/p>\n<p>Words from the same roots include <strong>grip<\/strong>, <strong>gripe<\/strong>, <strong>grab<\/strong>, <strong>grasp<\/strong>, <strong>grave<\/strong>, <strong>groove<\/strong>, <strong>grope<\/strong>, <strong>grovel<\/strong>, <strong>grub<\/strong> and <strong>engrave<\/strong> in English, <strong>gryp<\/strong> (to grab) in Afrikaans, <strong>gr\u00e4ifen<\/strong> (to reach for, grab, catch) in Luxembourgish, <strong>grinfia<\/strong> (claw) in Italian, <strong>gr\u00edpa<\/strong> (to catch, grab, clasp) in Icelandic, and <strong>grippe<\/strong> (influenza, flu) in French [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/Reconstruction:Proto-Germanic\/gr%C4%ABpan%C4%85\">source<\/a>]. <\/p>\n<p>Other ways to describe messy handwriting in English include <strong>scribble<\/strong>, <strong>scrawl<\/strong>, <strong>chicken scratch<\/strong> and <strong>cacography<\/strong>, which also means bad spelling or puntuation, or deliberate comic misspelling [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/cacography\">source<\/a>]. Are there others?<\/p>\n<p>Ways to describe messy handwriting in other languages include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>\u0561\u0563\u057c\u0561\u057e\u056b \u0573\u0561\u0576\u056f\u0565\u0580<\/strong> (\u0561\u0563\u057c\u0561\u057e\u056b \u0573\u0561\u0576\u056f\u0565\u0580) = crow&#8217;s claws in Armenian<\/li>\n<li><strong>\u6d82\u9e2d<\/strong> [\u5857\u9d28] (t\u00fa\u200by\u0101) = daub(ings) of a duck in Chinese<\/li>\n<li><strong>kraget\u00e6er<\/strong> = crow&#8217;s feet in Danish<\/li>\n<li><strong>hanenpoten<\/strong> = cockerel feet in Dutch<\/li>\n<li><strong>harakanvarpaat<\/strong> = magpie toes in Finnish<\/li>\n<li><strong>pattes de mouche<\/strong> = fly&#8217;s legs in French<\/li>\n<li><strong>\u03bf\u03c1\u03bd\u03b9\u03b8\u03bf\u03c3\u03ba\u03b1\u03bb\u03af\u03c3\u03bc\u03b1\u03c4\u03b1<\/strong> (ornithoskal\u00edsmata) = chicken carvings in Greek<\/li>\n<li><strong>ysgrifennu fel traed brain<\/strong> = writing like crow&#8217;s feet in Welsh  [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/scrawl#Noun\">source<\/a>]<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>It seems that messy handwriting is associated with crows and other birds in quite a few languages.<\/p>\n<p><em>This post was inspired by <a href=\"https:\/\/www.tiktok.com\/@yejuniverse\/video\/7667770184827964686\">this video<\/a> on TikTok.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- Blog horizontal --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\n     style=\"display:block\"\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     data-ad-slot=\"1685480124\"\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What do griffons have to do with messy writing? Let&#8217;s find out. Griffonage [\u02c8\u0261r\u026af\u0259\u02ccn\u0251\u02d0\u0292] is a rarely-used word that means careless handwriting or a crude or illegible scrawl. It comes from the French word griffonner (to scribble, scrawl), from griffer (to scratch), from Old French grifer, from griffe (claw, talon), from Old High German gr\u012bfan [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[84,205,95,100,102,104,107,109,111,118,124,128,10,20,34,178,44,45,77,80],"tags":[668,164,158,665,670,138,281,666,667,163],"class_list":["post-24694","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-afrikaans","category-armenian-","category-chinese","category-danish","category-dutch","category-english","category-etymology","category-finnish","category-french","category-greek","category-icelandic","category-italian","category-language","category-luxembourgish","category-old-french","category-old-high-german","category-proto-germanic","category-proto-indo-european","category-welsh","category-writing","tag-chicken-scratch","tag-english","tag-etymology","tag-griffonage","tag-handwriting","tag-language","tag-omniglot","tag-scrawl","tag-scribble","tag-words"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24694","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24694"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24694\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24699,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24694\/revisions\/24699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24694"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24694"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24694"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}