DRAWING, in art. Although the verb "to draw" has various meanings, the substantive _drawing_ is confined by usage to its artistic sense, delineation or design. The word "draw," from a root common to the Teutonic languages (Goth, _dragan_, O.H.G. _drahan_, Mod. Ger. _tragen_, which all have the sense of "carry," O. Norse _draga_, A.S. _drazan_, _drazen_, "draw," cf. Lat. _trahere_), means to pull or "drag" (a word of the same origin) as distinct from the action of pushing. It is thus used of traction generally, whether by men, animals or machines. The same idea is preserved in "drawing" as applied to the fine arts. We do not usually say, or think, that a sculptor is drawing when he is using his chisel, although he may be expressing or defining forms, nor that an engraver is drawing when he is pushing the burin with the palm of the hand, although the result may be the rendering of a design. But we do say that an artist is drawing when he uses the lead pencil, and here we have a motion bearing some resemblance to that of traction generally. The action of the artist in drawing the pencil point with his fingers along the paper is analogous, e.g., to that of a horse or man drawing a pole over soft ground and leaving a mark behind. The same analogy may be observed between two of the senses in which the French verb _tirer_ is frequently employed. This word, the origin of which is quite uncertain, was formerly used by good writers in the two senses of the verb to draw. Thus Lafontaine says, "Six forts chevaux _tiraient_ un coche"; and Caillières wrote, "Il n'y a pas longtemps que je me suis fait _tirer_ par Rigaud," meaning that Rigaud had drawn or painted his portrait. At the present day the verb _tirer_ has fallen into disuse amongst cultivated Frenchmen with regard to drawing and painting, but it is still universally used for all kinds of design and even for photography by the common people. The cultivated use it still for printing, as for example "cette gravure sera tirée à cent exemplaires," in the sense of pulling. A verb much more nearly related to the English verb _to draw_ is the French _traire_ (Lat. _trahere_), which has _trait_ for its past participle. _Traire_ is now used exclusively for milking cows and other animals, and though the analogy between this and artistic drawing is not obvious at first, nevertheless there is a certain analogy of motion, since the hand passing down the teat draws the milk downwards. The word _trait_ is much more familiar in connexion with art as "les traits du visage," the natural markings of the face, and it is very often used in a figurative sense, as we say "traits of character." It is familiar in the English _portrait_, derived from _protrahere_. The ancient Romans used words which expressed more clearly the conception that drawing was done in line (_delineare_) or in shade (_adumbrare_), though there are reasons for believing that the words were often indiscriminately applied. Although the modern Italians have both _traire_ and _trarre_, they use _delineare_ still in the sense of artistic drawing, and also _adombrare_. The Greek verb [Greek: graphein] appears in English in "graphic" and in many compounds, such as photograph, &c. It is worth observing that the Greeks seem to have considered drawing and writing (q.v.) as essentially the same process, since they used the same word for both. This points to the early identity of the two arts when drawing was a kind of writing, and when such writing as men had learned to practise was essentially what we should call drawing, though of a rude and simple kind. Even in the present day picture writing is not unfrequently resorted to by travellers as a means of making themselves intelligible. There is also a kind of art which is writing in the modern sense and drawing at the same time, such as the work of the medieval illuminators in their manuscripts. (X.)