海角大神

Last week we considered whether the incredible shrinking paragraph is in danger of breaking up altogether into one stand-alone sentence after another.

Now let鈥檚 look at the mark that indicates these breaks: 露. There it is, a backward capital 鈥淧鈥� (apparently), with its double-reinforced upright, standing ready to keep words from oozing from one block of text into the next. It is visible in certain old texts, notably Bibles and legal documents. (On a Mac, you can produce this character with Option + 7. Thank you, Steve Jobs.) But it labors on invisibly, too, in today鈥檚 world of electronic publishing. I always keep my 鈥渋nvisibles鈥� turned on, and as I write, I鈥檓 pushing a light blue pilcrow across the screen with every keystroke. A what, you ask?

You can call it a paragraph mark, or even just a paragraph. But you can save a syllable or two and maybe have a little more fun if you call it a pilcrow 鈥� even if the Oxford English Dictionary dismisses that term as 鈥淣ow chiefly hist.鈥�

It sounds like some kind of bird, doesn鈥檛 it? One can imagine a band of intrepid English birders in their tweeds and sensible walking shoes, with field glasses in hand, tromping over the moors in the mist, looking and listening for a creature known mainly by its odd cry, which seems to sound like 鈥淚ndent, indent!!鈥�

Well, maybe not.

came into English from Greek words meaning 鈥渨riting beside.鈥� That 鈥済raph鈥� particle is familiar from many English words derived from Greek, such as photography, literally 鈥渨riting with light.鈥� Para means 鈥渂eside鈥� 鈥� paralegals work beside lawyers, for instance.聽

Paragraph came into English first to mean a specific mark made in the margin of a page to call for a new section of a text, and later to mean the section itself.

The mark does not necessarily derive from the letter 鈥減,鈥� however. Some sources trace it to a 鈥渃,鈥� for capitulum, Latin for 鈥渓ittle heading,鈥� or 鈥渟ubhead,鈥� to use today鈥檚 term. A couple of years ago, ran a piece on the pilcrow that was illustrated with an image of a Latin grammar text, circa 1500. The paragraph marks there look like capital 鈥淐鈥檚鈥� with a vertical reinforcing line. (They look rather like the cent sign, actually: 垄. When did you last see that in print?) There are a lot of these breaks on the page, by the way. Short paragraphs are not a 21st-century innovation.

But where did the word pilcrow come from? Was it really some kind of bird?

During the 13th century, Old French had a couple of terms, pelagraphe and pelagreffe, in which the 鈥渓鈥� replaced the 鈥渞鈥� of paragraph: Oxford calls this process 鈥渄issimilation.鈥� Then English ears tried to hear these French imports as English words: pylcrafte, for instance 鈥� 鈥減ill craft鈥�? It sounds like a term for the work of a medieval pharmacist. Or 鈥減ill crow鈥� 鈥� perhaps 鈥渇rom 鈥榩ulled [plucked] crow,鈥� based on its appearance,鈥� as one speculates.

And that, dear reader, is how words, including odd ones, make it into our language.