- Pilcrow
The pilcrow (¶;
Unicode U+00B6
,HTML entity ¶
), also called theparagraph sign or the alinea (Latin : "a linea", "off the line"), is atypographical character commonly used to denote individualparagraph s. Thisnon-alphabetic symbol varies between typefaces, but the form shown here is typical.The pilcrow can be used as an indent for separate
paragraphs or to designate a new paragraph in one long piece of copy, asEric Gill did in his 1930s book, "An Essay On Typography". The pilcrow was used in theMiddle Ages to mark a newtrain of thought , before the convention ofphysically discrete paragraphs was commonplace.The pilcrow is usually drawn like a backwards letter
P reaching tocaps height orascender height, but may also be drawn with the bowl stretching further downwards, resembling a backwardsD .History and etymology
"Pilcrow" might be a
derivation of "paragraph" through "parcrafte"; the etymology is uncertain, yet, the "Oxford English Dictionary " says that 'apparently', "pilcrow" originated as an unattested version in English of the French "pelagraphe", a corruption of "paragraph"; the earliest reference is c.1440. Another derivation suggested is "pilcrow" originating as a letter "C", for "capitulum ", "chapter" in Latin. In this account, the "pilcrow" is the "paraph" symbol that replaced the "paragraphos ", which was marked with different symbols, including thesection sign . Moreover, the "paraph" also could be marked with a full-height, cents-like sign or with a double slash, originally symbols indicating a note from thescribe to the rubricator. [Parkes, M.B. "Pause and Effect: An Introduction to the History of Punctuation in the West." ISBN 0-520-07941-8.]Contemporary use
The pilcrow has been used in
desktop publishing software such asword processor s and page layout programs to mark the presence of acarriage return control character at the end of aparagraph . It is also used as the icon on a class oftoolbar button which shows or hides the pilcrow and similar "hidden characters", includingtab s, whitespace, andpage break s. Intyping programs , it is used to mark a return that one needs to type.In
legal writing , it is used whenever one mustreference a specific paragraph withinpleadings ,law review articles,statute s, or other legal documents and materials.In
proofreading , it is used to indicate that one paragraph should be split into two or more separate paragraphs; the pilcrow is inserted at the point at which a new paragraph should begin.Online , it is used in some blogs and wikis to denotepermalink s [ [http://www.tbray.org/ongoing/When/200x/2004/05/31/PurpleAgain ongoing — Purple Pilcrows] ] (cfPurple Numbers ).In
Unicode , thecharacter is called PILCROW SIGN, and hascodepoint U+00B6
. The HTML entity for it is¶
.The pilcrow
character can be added as a visible, printable character on the Windowsoperating system using theshortcut alt + 0182. Depending on the font used, this character will have varied appearance, and in some cases, may be replaced by an alternateglyph entirely.On a
Mac OS computer the pilcrow character can be generated by typing Option + 7.Paragraph signs in non-Latin writing systems
In Chinese, the traditional paragraph sign is a thin
circle about the same size as a Chinese character. This same mark also serves as a “zero” character, as astylistic variation of the Chinese character for “zero”. As a paragraph sign, this mark only appears in olderbooks . Its current use is generally as a “zero ” character.In Thai, the character ๛ (
Unicode U+0E5B
, Thai character Khomut) can be used to mark the end of achapter ordocument .ee also
*
Section sign
*Paragraphos References
External links
* [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pilcrow Pilcrow definition] at the [http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/pilcrow Dictionary.com website]
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