Mechanisms drawing is a fundamental tool for mechanical design algorithms and representation. An historiographical study on the evolution of representation forms and means has been carried out in this paper with the aim to recognise a historic background and to individuate the progress in the time. Some basic changes in the evolution of mechanisms drawing have been identified by investigating several Authors, but few examples have been reported in the paper to stress the focused concepts. It has been recognised that the drawing of mechanisms have had an evolution from an intentionally uncompleted representation to a naturalistic and pictorial view of running description, then from schematic sketches and kinematic diagrams up to some modern abstract graph pictures.