Word.ws English Dictionary

penman

penman noun: a scribe, or a person who copies texts.

Noun

penman (plural penmen)

  1. A scribe, or a person who copies texts.
  2. A person with writing skills; a journalist or other author.
    • [T]he holy Pen-men of the Nevv Teſtament ſeem to have borrovv'd and apply'd it [the word mystery] to ſome of the Great and Arduous Truths of Chriſtianity, ſuch as human Reaſon cannot give a clear and explicit Account of.1693, [Robert South], chapter I, in Animadversions upon Dr. Sherlock’s Book, Entituled A Vindication of the Holy and Ever-blessed Trinity, &c. […], London: […] Randal Taylor, […], →OCLC, page 2
    • Well, I often wish I were a penman; but I never could do it. I’ll read any day as long as you like, but that writing, I could never manage.1845, B[enjamin] Disraeli, Sybil; or The Two Nations. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC
  3. (slang) A forger.
    • Forgers, counterfeiters (penmen) and other such intellectuals have a certain standing in the underworld and even pickpockets are respected more or less as the masters of a difficult art, but they do not rank with the princes of the big con […][1962, H. L. Mencken, The American Language, supplement 2, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, →OCLC, page 669

Proper noun capitalized: Penman

Penman (plural Penmans)

  1. A surname.

Forms of penman

Noun
pluralpenmen
Proper noun
pluralPenmans

Plural of penman: penmen

Origin of penman

From pen + -man.

Words formed from penman

Phrases with penman

Questions about penman

What does penman mean?
Penman means a scribe, or a person who copies texts.
What part of speech is penman?
Penman can be a noun or a proper noun.
What is the plural of penman?
The plural of penman is penmen.

Words near penman in the dictionary

  1. Penmaenmawr
  2. Penmaenpool
  3. penmaker
  4. penmakers
  5. penmaking
  6. penman
  7. Penman equation
  8. Penmans
  9. penmanship
  10. penmanships
  11. penmate

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: penman (page history and authors); Penman (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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Cite this entry: “penman.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/penman. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.