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Typographical symbols and punctuation marks are marks and symbols used in typography with a variety of purposes such as to help with legibility and accessibility, or to identify special cases. This list gives those most commonly encountered with Latin script. For a far more comprehensive list of symbols and signs, see List of Unicode characters.
Punctuation marks are marks indicating how a piece of written text should be read (silently or aloud) and, consequently, understood. [1] The oldest known examples of punctuation marks were found in the Mesha Stele from the 9th century BC, consisting of points between the words and horizontal strokes between sections.
Punctuation in the English language helps the reader to understand a sentence through visual means other than just the letters of the alphabet. [1] English punctuation has two complementary aspects: phonological punctuation, linked to how the sentence can be read aloud, particularly to pausing; [2] and grammatical punctuation, linked to the structure of the sentence. [3]
For example, the 1998 edition of Fowler's Modern English Usage used full point for the mark used after an abbreviation, but full stop or full point when it was employed at the end of a sentence; [10] the 2015 edition, however, treats them as synonymous (and prefers full stop), [11] and New Hart's Rules does likewise (but prefers full point). [12]
Still other guides take a laissez-faire approach. For example, the University of Sussex's online guide notes regional variation in the use of apostrophes in dates, [76] and slightly prefers 1's and 7's over 1s and 7s but condones both. The apostrophe is very often used in plurals of symbols, for example "that page has too many &'s and #'s on it".
The ditto mark is a shorthand sign, used mostly in hand-written text, indicating that the words or figures above it are to be repeated. [1] [2]The mark is made using "a pair of apostrophes"; [1] "a pair of marks " used underneath a word"; [3] the symbol " (quotation mark); [2] [4] or the symbol ” (right double quotation mark).
Fowler's A Dictionary of Modern English Usage provides an early example of the rule: "All signs of punctuation used with words in quotation marks must be placed according to the sense." [28] When dealing with words-as-words, short-form works and sentence fragments, this style places periods and commas outside the quotation marks:
Many (but not all) graphemes that are part of a writing system that encodes a full spoken language are included in the Unicode standard, which also includes graphical symbols. See: Language code; List of Unicode characters; List of writing systems; Punctuation; List of typographical symbols and punctuation marks