Meaning & use

scribe

noun·Advanced

A person employed to copy out documents by hand, especially before printing was invented.

See it in a sentence

Medieval scribes spent months copying a single manuscript by candlelight.

The ancient scribe recorded the king's decrees on clay tablets.

A note on using this word

Scribe is sometimes used loosely today for a note-taker or writer, as in 'act as scribe for the meeting.'

Words with a similar meaning

copyist

Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.

Make it your own

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