[mod. f. Gr. κρυπτός hidden + γράμμα writing, a letter, but not on Greek analogies: see -GRAM. So mod.F. cryptogramme.] A piece of cryptographic writing; anything written in cipher, or in such a form or order that a key is required in order to know how to understand and put together the letters.
1880. Times, 28 Dec., 10/1. In every case of deciphering—whether it be of a Cypriote inscription or a cryptogram in the agony column.
1888. I. Donnelly (title), The Great Cryptogram: Francis Bacon’s Cipher in The so-called Shakespeare Plays.
Hence Cryptogramic a., pertaining to or of the nature of a cryptogram. So also Cryptogrammatic, -ical adjs.; Cryptogrammatist.
1884. Bazaar, 22 Dec., 666/2. Every vowel and consonant in the words of the cryptogramic sentence was represented.
1888. Scott. Leader, 4 July, 4. Mr. Ignatius Donnelly … with his cryptogramic theory of Shakspere.
1892. Athenæum, 13 Feb., 211/2. Mr. Donnelly keeps his cryptogrammatical tendencies in check. Ibid. (1890), 8 March, 316/3. America will some day produce … a cryptogrammatist ready to prove that ‘The Ring and the Book’ was written by Lord Tennyson.
