Interpunct

"Middot" redirects here. For the religious tractate, seeMiddot (Talmud).

·
Interpunct
InUnicode	U+00B7·MIDDLE DOT(·, ·, ·)
Different from
Different from	U+2027‧HYPHENATION POINT U+2219∙BULLET OPERATOR U+22C5⋅DOT OPERATOR U+A78FꞏLATIN LETTER SINOLOGICAL DOT
Related
See also	U+02D1ˑMODIFIER LETTER HALF TRIANGULAR COLON

Aninterpunct⟨·⟩,also known as aninterpoint,middle dot,middot,centered dotorcentred dot,is a punctuation mark consisting of a vertically centered dot used forinterword separationinClassical Latin.(Word-separating spacesdid not appear until some time between 600 and 800CE.) It appears in a variety of uses in some modern languages.

Themultiplication dotor "dot operator" is frequently used in mathematical and scientific notation, and it may differ in appearance from the interpunct.

In written language

Various dictionaries use the interpunct (in this context, sometimes called a hyphenation point) to indicate where to split a word and insert a hyphen if the word doesn't fit on the line. There is also a separate Unicode character,U+2027‧HYPHENATION POINT.

English

Bradford's transcription of theMayflower Compact

InBritishtypography,thespace dotwas once used as the formaldecimal point.Its use was advocated by laws and can still be found in some UK-based academic journals such asThe Lancet.When thepound sterlingwasdecimalisedin 1971, the official advice issued was to write decimal amounts with a raised point (for example,£21·48) and to use a decimal point "on the line" only when typesetting constraints made it unavoidable. However, this usage had already been declining since the 1968 ruling by theMinistry of Technologyto use thefull stopas the decimal point,not only because of that ruling but also because it isthe widely-adopted international standard,and because the standardUK keyboard layout(for typewriters and computers) has only the full stop. The space dot is still used by some in handwriting.

In the early modern era, full stops (periods) were sometimes written as interpuncts (for example in the depicted 1646 transcription of theMayflower Compact).

In theShavian Alpha bet,interpuncts replacecapitalizationas the marker of proper nouns. The dot is placed at the beginning of a word.

Catalan

Metro stationParal·lelinBarcelona

Thepunt volat( "flying point" ) is used inCatalanbetween twoLsin cases where each belongs to a separate syllable, for examplecel·la,"cell". This distinguishes such "geminateLs "(ela geminada), which are pronounced[ɫː],from "double L" (doble ela), which are written without the flying point and are pronounced[ʎ].In situations where the flying point is unavailable,periods(as incol.lecció) orhyphens(as incol-lecció) are frequently used as substitutes, but this is tolerated rather than encouraged.

Historically, medieval Catalan also used the symbol·as a marker for certainelisions,much like the modern apostrophe (seeOccitanbelow) andhyphenations.

There is no separate physicalkeyboard layoutfor Catalan: the flying point can be typed using⇧ Shift+3in theSpanish (Spain) layoutor withOption+⇧ Shift+9on a US English layout. On a mobile phone with a Catalan keyboard layout, the geminate L with a flying dot appears when holding down theLkey. It appears inUnicodeas thepre-composedlettersĿ(U+013F) andŀ(U+0140), but they arecompatibility charactersand are not frequently used or recommended.

Chinese

The interpunct is used inChinese(which generally lacks spacing betweencharacters) to mark divisions in wordstransliteratedfromphonogramlanguages, particularly names. Lacking its own code point in Unicode, the interpunct in Chinese shares the code point U+00B7 (·), and it is properly (and inTaiwanformally)of full-width U+30FB (・). When the Chinese text isromanized,the partition sign is simply replaced by a standard space or other appropriate punctuation. Thus,William Shakespeareis written asWilliam · Shakespeare(Wēilián Shāshìbǐyà) andGeorge W. BushasGeorge ·W· bố cái(George ·W· bố thù;Qiáozhì W. Bùshí). Titles and other translated words are not similarly marked:Genghis KhanandElizabeth IIare simplyThành Cát Tư Hãn(Chéngjísī hán) andElizabeth nhị thế(Elizabeth nhị thế;Yīlìshābái èrshì) without a partition sign.

The partition sign is also used to separate book and chapter titles when they are mentioned consecutively: book first and then chapter.

Hokkien

InPe̍h-ōe-jīforTaiwanese Hokkien,middle dot is often used as a workaround for thedot aboverightdiacritic,since most early encoding systems did not support this diacritic. This is now encoded asU+0358◌͘COMBINING DOT ABOVE RIGHT(seeo͘). Unicode did not support this diacritic until June 2005. Newer fonts often support it natively; however, the practice of using middle dot still exists. Historically, it was derived in the late 19th century from an older barred-o with curly tail as an adaptation to the typewriter.

Tibetan

Main article:Tibetan Alpha bet

InTibetanthe interpunct, calledtsek(ཙེག་), is used as amorphemedelimiter.

Ethiopic

TheGeʽez(Ethiopic) script traditionallyseparates wordswith an interpunct of two vertically aligned dots, like acolon,but with larger dots:U+1361፡ETHIOPIC WORDSPACE.(For exampleገድለ፡ወለተ፡ጴጥሮስ).Starting in the late 19th century the use of such punctuation has largely fallen out of use in favor of whitespace, except in formal hand-written or liturgical texts. In Eritrea the character may be used as a comma.

Franco-Provençal

InFranco-Provençal(or Arpitan), the interpunct is used in order to distinguish the following graphemes:

• ch·,pronounced[ʃ],versusch,pronounced[ts]
• j·,pronounced[ʒ],versusj,pronounced[dz]
• g·beforee, i,pronounced[ʒ],versusgbeforee, i,pronounced[dz]

French

In modernFrench,the interpunct is sometimes used forgender-neutralwriting, as inles salarié·e·sforles salariés et les salariées( "the employees [both male and female]" ).

Greek

Ancient Greeklacked spacing or interpuncts but instead ran all the letters together. ByLate Antiquity,various marks were used to separate words, particularly theGreek comma.

Themodern Greek,theano teleiamark (Greek:άνω τελεία,romanized:ánō teleía,lit. 'upper stop'; also known asάνω στιγμή,áno stigmí) is the infrequently-encountered Greek semicolon and is properlyromanizedas such.It is also used to introduce lists in the manner of an Englishcolon.In Greek text,Unicodeprovides the code pointU+0387·GREEK ANO TELEIA,however, it is also expressed as an interpunct. In practice, the separate code point for ano teleia canonically decomposes to the interpunct.

The Hellenistic scholars ofAlexandriafirst developed the mark for a function closer to thecomma,before it fell out of use and was then repurposed for its present role.

Japanese

Main article:Japanese punctuation

Interpuncts are often used to separate transcribed foreign names or words written inkatakana.For example, "Beautiful Sunday"becomesビューティフル・サンデー(Byūtifuru·sandē). A middle dot is also sometimes used to separate lists inJapaneseinstead of theJapanese comma.Dictionaries andgrammarlessons in Japanese sometimes also use a similar symbol to separate averbsuffixfrom its root. While some fonts may render the Japanese middle dot as a square under great magnification, this is not a defining property of the middle dot that is used in China or Japan.

However, the Japanese writing system usually does not use space or punctuation to separate words (though the mi xing of katakana,kanjiandhiraganagives some indication of word boundary).

In Japanesetypography,there exist two Unicode code points:

• U+30FB・KATAKANA MIDDLE DOT,with a fixed width that is the same as most kana characters, known asfullwidth.
• U+FF65･HALFWIDTH KATAKANA MIDDLE DOT

The interpunct also has a number of other uses in Japanese, including the following: to separate titles, names and positions:Khóa trường bổ tá ・ linh mộc(Assistant Section Head · Suzuki); as a decimal point when writing numbers in kanji:Tam ・ một bốn một năm chín nhị (3.141 592);as a slash when writing for "or" in abbreviations:Nguyệt ・ thủy ・ Kim Diệu Nhật (Mon/Wed/Friday);and in place of hyphens, dashes and colons when writing vertically.

Korean

Interpuncts are used in written Korean to denote a list of two or more words, similarly to how aslash(/) is used to juxtapose words in many other languages. In this role it also functions in a similar way to the Englishen dash,as in미·소관계,"American–Soviet relations". The use of interpuncts has declined in years of digital typography and especially in place of slashes, but, in the strictest sense, a slash cannot replace a middle dot in Korean typography.

U+318DㆍHANGUL LETTER ARAEA(아래아) is used more than a middle dot when an interpunct is to be used in Korean typography, thougharaeais technically not a punctuation symbol but actually anobsolete Hanguljamo.Becausearaeais afull-widthletter, it looks better than middle dot between Hangul. In addition, it is drawn like the middle dot in Windows default Korean fonts such asBatang.

Latin

The interpunct (interpunctus) was regularly used inclassical Latinto separate words. In addition to the most common round form,inscriptionssometimes use a smallequilateral trianglefor the interpunct, pointing either up or down. It may also appear as a mid-line comma, similar to theGreekpractice of the time. The interpunct fell out of usec. 200 CE,andLatinwas then writtenscripta continuafor several centuries.

Occitan

InOccitan,especially in theGascondialect, the interpunct (punt interior,literally, "inner dot", orponch nautfor "high / upper point" ) is used to distinguish the following graphemes:

• s·h,pronounced[s.h],versussh,pronounced[ʃ],for example, indes·har'to undo' vsdeishar'to leave'
• n·h,pronounced[n.h],versusnh,pronounced[ɲ],for example inin·hèrn'hell' vsvinha'vineyard'

Although it is considered to be a spelling error, aperiodis frequently used when a middle dot is unavailable:des.har, in.hèrn,which is the case for Frenchkeyboard layout.

InOld Occitan,the symbol·was sometimes used to denote certainelisions,much like the modern apostrophe, the only difference being that the word that gets to be elided is always placed after the interpunct, the word before ending either in a vowel sound or the lettern:

• que·l(que lo,that the) versusqu'el(that he)
• FromBertran de Born'sAb joi mou lo vers e·l comens(translated by James H. Donalson):

Bela Domna·l vostre cors gens
E·lh vostre bel olh m'an conquis,
E·l doutz esgartz e lo clars vis,
E·l vostre bels essenhamens,
Que, can be m'en pren esmansa,
De beutat no·us trob egansa:
La genser etz c'om posc'e·l mon chauzir,
O no·i vei clar dels olhs ab que·us remir.

Domna·l[ˈdonnal]=Domna, lo( "Lady, the": singulardefinite article)
E·lh[eʎ]=E li( "And the": plural definite article)
E·l[el]=E lo( "And the" )
E·l=E lo( "And the" )

No·us[nows]=Non vos( "(do) not... you":direct objectpronoun)
E·l=En lo( "in the" )
No·i[noj]=Non i( "(do) not... there" ) //Que·us[kews]=Que vos( "that (I)... you" )

O pretty lady, all your grace
and eyes of beauty conquered me,
sweet glance and brightness of your face
and all your nature has to tell
so if I make an appraisal
I find no one like in beauty:
most pleasing to be found in all the world
or else the eyes I see you with have dimmed.

Old Irish

In many linguistic works discussingOld Irish(but not in actual Old Irish manuscripts), the interpunct is used to separate a pretonic preverbal element from the stressed syllable of the verb, e.g.do·beir"gives". It is also used in citing the verb forms used after such preverbal elements (theprototonicforms), e.g.·beir"carries", to distinguish them from forms used without preverbs, e.g.beirid"carries".In other works, thehyphen(do-beir,-beir) orcolon(do:beir,:beir) may be used for this purpose.

Runes

Runictexts use either an interpunct-like or a colon-like punctuation mark to separate words. There are twoUnicodecharacters dedicated for this:

• U+16EB᛫RUNIC SINGLE PUNCTUATION
• U+16EC᛬RUNIC MULTIPLE PUNCTUATION

In mathematics and science

⋅
Multiplication dot
InUnicode	U+22C5⋅DOT OPERATOR(⋅)
Related
See also	U+2219∙BULLET OPERATOR

Up to the middle of the 20th century, and sporadically even much later, the interpunct could be found used as thedecimal markerin British publications, such as tables of constants (e.g., "π = 3·14159"). This made expressions such as15 · 823potentially ambiguous; in which it could denote either15 × 823 = 12345or15⁠823/1000⁠.In situations where the interpunct is used as a decimal point, the multiplication sign used is usually a full stop (period), not an interpunct.

In publications conforming to the standards of theInternational System of Units,as well as the multiplication sign (×), the centered dot (dot operator) or space (often typographically anon-breaking space) can be used as a multiplication sign. Only acommaorfull stop (period)may be used as a decimal marker. The centered dot can be used when multiplying units, as inm·kg·s⁻²for thenewtonexpressed in terms of SI base units. However, when the decimal point is used as the decimal marker, as in the United States, the use of a centered dot for the multiplication of numbers or values of quantities is discouraged.

Inmathematics,a small middle dot can be used to representmultiplication;for example,$x\cdot y$for multiplying$x$by${\textstyle y}$.When dealing withscalars,it is interchangeable with themultiplication sign(×), as long as the multiplication sign is between numerals such that it would not be mistaken as variable${\textstyle x}$.For instance,${\textstyle 2\cdot 3y}$means the same thing as${\textstyle 2\times 3y}$.However, when dealing withvectors,the dot operator denotes adot product(e.g.${\textstyle {\vec {x}}\cdot {\vec {y}}}$,a scalar), which is distinct from thecross product(e.g.${\vec {x}}\times {\vec {y}}$,a vector).

Another usage of this symbol in mathematics is withfunctions,where the dot is used as a placeholder for afunction argument,in order to distinguish between the (general form of the) function itself and the value or a specific form of a function evaluated at a given point or with given specifications.For example,${\textstyle f(\cdot )}$denotes the function${\textstyle x\mapsto f(x)}$,and$\theta (s,a,\cdot )$denotes apartial application,where the first two arguments are given and the third argument shall take any valid value on its domain.

Thebullet operator,∙,U+2219, is sometimes used to denote the"AND" relationshipin formallogic.

Incomputing,the middle dot is usually displayed (but not printed) to indicatewhite spacein various software applications such asword processing,graphic design,web layout,desktop publishingorsoftware developmentprograms. In someword processors,interpuncts are used to denote not onlyhard spaceor space characters, but also sometimes used to indicate a space when put in paragraph format to show indentations and spaces. This allows the user to see where white space is located in the document and what sizes of white space are used, since normally white space is invisible so tabs, spaces, non-breaking spaces and such are indistinguishable from one another.

Inchemistry,the middle dot is used to separate the parts of formulas ofaddition compounds,mixture salts or solvates (typically hydrates), such as ofcopper(II) sulphate pentahydrate,CuSO₄·5H₂O.The middle dot should not be surrounded by spaces when indicating a chemical adduct.

The middot as a letter

A middot may be used as aconsonantormodifier letter,rather than as punctuation, in transcription systems and in language orthographies. For such uses Unicode provides the code pointU+A78FꞏLATIN LETTER SINOLOGICAL DOT.

InAmericanist phonetic notation,the middot is a more common variant of thecolon⟨꞉⟩used to indicatevowel length.It may be called ahalf-colonin such usage. Graphically, it may be high in the letter space (the top dot of the colon) or centered as the interpunct. From Americanist notation, it has been adopted into the orthographies of several languages, such asWasho.

In the writings ofFranz Boas,the middot was used for palatal orpalatalizedconsonants, e.g.⟨kꞏ⟩for IPA [c].

In the Sinological tradition of the36 initials,the onset ảnh (typically reconstructed as aglottal stop) may be transliterated with a middot⟨ꞏ⟩,and the onset 喩 (typically reconstructed as anull onset) with anapostrophe⟨ʼ⟩.Conventions vary, however, and it is common for ảnh to be transliterated with the apostrophe. These conventions are used both for Chinese itself and for other scripts of China, such asʼPhags-paandJurchen.

In theCanadian Aboriginal Syllabics,a middle dot ⟨ᐧ⟩ indicates a syllable medial ⟨w⟩ inCreeandOjibwe,⟨y⟩ or ⟨yu⟩ in some of theAthapascan languages,and a syllable medial ⟨s⟩ inBlackfoot.However, depending on the writing tradition, the middle dot may appear after the syllable it modifies (which is found in the Western style) or before the syllable it modifies (which is found in the Northern and Eastern styles). In Unicode, the middle dot is encoded both as independent glyphU+1427ᐧCANADIAN SYLLABICS FINAL MIDDLE DOTor as part of a pre-composed letter, such as inU+143CᐼCANADIAN SYLLABICS PWI.In theCarrier syllabicssubset, the middle dot Final indicates a glottal stop, but a centered dot diacritic on[ə]-position letters transform the vowel value to[i],for example:U+1650ᙐCANADIAN SYLLABICS CARRIER SE,U+1652ᙒCANADIAN SYLLABICS CARRIER SI.

Keyboard input

On computers, the interpunct may be available through various key combinations, depending on theoperating systemand thekeyboard layout.Assuming aQWERTYkeyboard layout unless otherwise stated:

• on ApplemacOS,an interpunct can be entered by pressing⌥ Opt+⇧ Shift+9(or⌥ Opt+⇧ Shift+.on the Norwegian and Swedish keyboard layouts,⌥ Opt+.on the Danish keyboard layout,⌥ Opt+⇧ Shift+Fon the French keyboard layout and on the French Canadian keyboard layout⌥ Opt+⇧ Shift+H);
• onLinuxcomputers with theX Window Systemand onChromeOSit can be inserted by pressingAltGr+.;it can also be inserted via theCompose keysequence^+..Alternatively, using the genericUnicode inputmethod, it may be obtained by pressingCtrl+⇧ Shift+Uand then typingb7↵ Enter(B7 Is the Unicodehexadecimalcodepoint for the interpunct);
• onMicrosoft Windowswithcodepage 1252,it can be inserted by pressingAlt+250orAlt+0183(on thenumeric keypad). The default shortcut using AZERTY Greek polytonic keyboard layout (EL) isAltGr+⇧ Shift+$.

Similar symbols

Symbol	Character Entity	Numeric Entity	UnicodeCode Point	LaTeX	Notes
·	· · ·	·	U+00B7MIDDLE DOT	\textperiodcentered	The interpunct
ˑ		ˑ	U+02D1MODIFIER LETTER HALF TRIANGULAR COLON		IPA interpunct symbol: the triangular middot.
·		·	U+0387GREEK ANO TELEIA		Greekánō stigmē
ּ		ּ	U+05BCHEBREW POINT DAGESH OR MAPPIQ		Hebrew pointdageshormapiq
᛫		᛫	U+16EBRUNIC SINGLE PUNCTUATION		Runicpunctuation
•	•	•	U+2022BULLET	\textbullet	bullet,often used to mark list items
‧		‧	U+2027HYPHENATION POINT		hyphenation point(dictionaries)
∘	∘	∘	U+2218RING OPERATOR	\circ	ring operator (mathematics)
∙		∙	U+2219BULLET OPERATOR	\bullet	bullet operator (mathematics)
⋅	⋅	⋅	U+22C5DOT OPERATOR	\cdot,\cdotp	dot operator (mathematics)
⏺		⏺	U+23FABLACK CIRCLE FOR RECORD		black circle forrecord
●		●	U+25CFBLACK CIRCLE
◦		◦	U+25E6WHITE BULLET		hollow bullet
⚫		⚫	U+26ABMEDIUM CIRCLE BLACK		medium black circle
⦁		⦁	U+2981Z NOTATION SPOT		symbol used by theZ notation
⸰		⸰	U+2E30RING POINT		Avestanpunctuation mark
⸱		⸱	U+2E31WORD SEPARATOR MIDDLE DOT		word separator (Avestan and other scripts)
⸳		⸳	U+2E33RAISED DOT		vertical position betweenfull stopand middle dot
・		・	U+30FBKATAKANA MIDDLE DOT		fullwidthkatakanamiddle dot
ꞏ		ꞏ	U+A78FLATIN LETTER SINOLOGICAL DOT		as a letter
･		･	U+FF65HALFWIDTH KATAKANA MIDDLE DOT		halfwidthkatakana middle dot
𐄁		𐄁	U+10101AEGEAN WORD SEPARATOR DOT		word separator for Aegean scripts(Linear AandLinear B)

Characters in the Symbol column above may not render correctly in all browsers.

See also

• Punctuation
• Syllabification
• Dot (disambiguation)

External links

• Media related toInterpunctsat Wikimedia Commons