The prototypical pencil may have been the ancient Roman stylus, which was a thin metal stick used for scratching on papyrus, often made of lead. The word pencil comes from the Latin word penicillus which means "little tail".

In 1564, an enormous deposit of graphite was discovered at the site of Seathwaite Fell near Borrowdale, Cumbria, England. The locals found that it was very useful for marking sheep. This particular deposit of graphite was extremely pure and solid and it could easily be sawed into sticks. This was and remains the only deposit of graphite ever found in this solid form. Chemistry was in its infancy and the substance was thought to be a form of lead. Consequently it was called plumbago (Latin for "acts like lead"). The black core of pencils is still called "lead", even though it does not contain the element lead.