Polygraph (author)

This article is about an author that can write on a variety of different subjects. For the early 19th-century device used for duplication of writing, see Polygraph (duplicating device). For the modern forensic instrument, see Polygraph. For the automatic signing instrument, see Autopen.
Portrait of French polygraph Denis Diderot (1767, Louis-Michel van Loo)

A polygraph (from Ancient Greek: πολύς, poly = "many" and γράφειν, graphein = "to write") is an author who writes in a variety of fields.[1]

In literature, the term polygraph is often applied to certain writers of antiquity such as Aristotle, Plutarch, Varro, Cicero and Pliny the Elder. Polygraphs still existed in the Middle Ages and Renaissance, but, other than writers of books for children, they have become rarer in modern times due to the specialisation of knowledge. Voltaire and Diderot are examples of modern polygraphs.

  1. ^ "Definition of polygraph | Dictionary.com". www.dictionary.com. Retrieved 2020-12-12.