"shorthand used by journalists in cablegrams," 1916, from cable in the telegraphic sense + -ese as a language-name suffix. "Since cablegrams had to be paid for by the word and even press rates were expensive the practice was to affix Latin prefixes and suffixes to make one word do the work of several" [Daniel Schorr], such as exLondon and Londonward to mean "from London," "to London" (non-Latin affixes also were used). Hence the tale, famous in the lore of the United Press International, of the distinguished but harried foreign correspondent who reached his breaking point and wired headquarters UPSTICK JOB ASSWARD. Its economy and expressive power fascinated Hemingway in his newspapering days.

any apparatus for transmitting intelligible messages at a distance; 1794, originally in reference to a semaphore apparatus involving flags on poles (hence the Telegraph Hill neighborhoods in some cities), etymologically "that which writes at a distance," from French télégraphe, from télé- "far" (from Greek tēle-; see tele-) + -graphe (see -graphy).

The signaling device had been invented in France in 1791 by the brothers Chappe, who had called it tachygraphe, literally "that which writes fast," but the better name was suggested to them by French diplomat Comte André-François Miot de Mélito (1762-1841).

In 1797 the word first was applied to an experimental electric telegraph (designed by Dr. Don Francisco Salva at Barcelona); the practical version was developed 1830s by U.S. inventor Samuel F.B. Morse (1791-1872). The meaning "telegraphic message" is from 1821 (compare telegram). Related: Telegraphy.