epigram, a short, polished, pithy saying, usually in verse, often with a satiric or paradoxical twist at the end. The term was originally applied by the Greeks to the inscriptions on stones. The epigrams of the Latin poet Martial established the form for many later writers. In England the epigram flourished in the work of innumerable poets including Donne, Herrick, Ben Jonson, Pope, Byron, Coleridge, and Walter Savage Landor. Great German epigrammatists include Logau, Lessing, and Herder. In 18th-century France, Boileau-Despréaux, Lebrun, and Voltaire excelled in the form. Poets of the 20th cent. who are noted for their epigrams include Yeats, Pound, Roy Campbell, and Ogden Nash. One of the most brilliant of prose epigrammatists was Oscar Wilde. His works are studded with epigrams, such as "I can resist everything except temptation."

Short poem treating concisely, pointedly, and often satirically a single thought or event and often ending with a witticism or ingenious turn of thought. By extension, the term applies to a terse, sage, or witty (often paradoxical) saying, usually in the form of a generalization. Writers of Latin epigrams included Catullus and Martial. The form was revived in the Renaissance. Later masters of the epigram have included Ben Jonson; François VI, duke de La Rochefoucauld; Voltaire; Alexander Pope; Samuel Taylor Coleridge; Oscar Wilde; and George Bernard Shaw.

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