Dictionary

ambigram en · NOUN

Etymology

From ambi- + -gram. Coined by Douglas Hofstadter in 1983-1984.

Meanings

1. A calligraphic design that may be read as the same word or phrase (or sometimes different words or phrases) when oriented in two different ways, usually when reflected along a vertical or horizontal axis or when rotated through 180 degrees.
   • 1997, Research and Education Networking, Volume 8, Issues 1-6, page 290, An ambigram is a word that reads the same right-side-up and upside-down. MOW is a natural ambigram, for instance, but any word can be flipped if the right graphic artist gets his hands on it.
   • Two nonvisual factors provide dissymmetry and prevent the ambigram from existing in a static equilibrium; most of the letters in an ambigram metamorphose into other letters when reversed; and each of those accompanying sentences provides a different idea of the word's meaning. 1992, John Langdon, Wordplay, published 2005, page 52:
   • Next, I imagine that Switch #2 causes me every single weekend (and every other spare moment as well) to elect, instead of designing ambigrams or working hard on my book about being a strange loop, to spend hours on end watching professional football games on a huge-screen television and delightedly ogling all the busty babes in the beer ads. 2007, Douglas Hofstadter, I Am a Strange Loop, page 312:

Forms

Translations (20)

fi ambigrammi (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · ru амбигра́мма (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · pt ambigrama (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · es ambigrama (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · pl ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · lt ambigrama (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · no ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · da ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · fr ambigramme (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · he אמביגראמה (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · nl ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · tr ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · cs ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · it ambigramma (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · de Ambigramm (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · cmn 雙面語 /双面语 (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · sv ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · lb Ambigramm (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · sl ambigram (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations) · hu ambigramma (design that reads as the same word or phrase in two different orientations)

wikipedia: Indiana University Bloomington · wikipedia: Merriam-Webster