Punctuation, Frederick W. Hamilton [english readers .txt] 📗

The prisoner said the witness was a sneak thief.

The prisoner, said the witness, was a sneak thief.

The meaning of this sentence depends entirely on the presence or absence of the two commas.

Manuscript comes in to the printer hastily written by the customer, author, or a reporter, or ticked over the telegraph wire, and there is little or no punctuation. Probably the context will supply the needed information and the line may be set up correctly. If there is no way of finding out what the sentence means, follow copy. Insert no punctuation marks which you are not sure are needed.

Punctuation as we know it is of recent invention. The practice of the art of printing brought the necessity for a defined and systematized use of the points which had, most of them, long been in existence, but which had been used largely according to the personal preferences of the scribes or copyists. With the coming of the new methods of book reproduction came the recognized need for standardization and systematization.

The most ancient inscriptions and manuscripts are merely strings of letters, without spacing between words or sentences and without any points of any sort, like the example on page 1.

The first mark to be used was the dot, or period. Its original purpose was simply to furnish a resting place for the eye and the mind and so help a little in the grouping of the letters into words, clauses, and sentences, which the mind had hitherto been compelled to do unaided. It was used at the end of a sentence, at the end of a clause, to indicate abbreviations, to separate crowded words, especially where the sense was ambiguous (ANICEMAN might be either AN ICE MAN or A NICE MAN), or even as an æsthetic ornament between the letters of an inscription. In early manuscripts the period is usually placed high (˙) instead of low (.).

Sometimes a slanting mark (/) or a double dot (: or ..) was used to indicate the end of an important section of the writing or even of a sentence.

After a time spaces were introduced to show the grouping of the letters and the words. At first the sentences were separated by spaces, then the long words, and finally all words. In some languages, as in Italian, there are still combinations of long and short words, such as the combination of the pronoun with the verb, as in datemi, give me.

During the manuscript period different schools of copyists and even different individuals used different marks and different systems of pointing. For a considerable time the location of the dot indicated its force. Placed high (˙) it had the force of a period. Placed in a middle position (·) it had the force of a comma. Placed low (.) it had the force of a semicolon. The rule, however, was not universally observed. A Latin manuscript of the seventh century has a high dot (˙) equivalent to a comma, a semicolon used as at present, and a dot accompanied by another dot or a dash to indicate the end of a sentence. A Latin manuscript of the ninth century shows the comma and an inverted semicolon ([;]) having a value between the semicolon and colon. Mediæval manuscript pointing, therefore, approximates modern forms in places, but lacks standardization into recognized systems.

The spread of printing brought new needs into prominence. The early printers used the period at the end of the sentence, the colon, and sometimes the slanting line (/). A reversed semicolon was used as a question mark. Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton’s successor in the printing business in London, used five points in 1509. They were the period, the semicolon, the comma, the “interrogative,” and the parenthesis.

The systematization of punctuation is due mainly to the careful and scholarly Aldus Manutius, who had opened a printing office in Venice in 1494. The great printers of the early day were great scholars as well. For a very long time the chief concern of the printer was the opening of the treasures of ancient thought to the world. They were therefore compelled to be the students, critics, and editors of the old manuscripts which served them as copy. They naturally took their punctuation from the Greek grammarians, but sometimes with changed meanings. The semicolon, for instance, is the Greek mark of interrogation.

The period took its name from the Greek word περίοδος, periodos, meaning a division of a sentence or a thought, as we to-day speak of an orator’s eloquent periods.

The colon comes from the Greek κῶλον, kolon, meaning a limb.

The comma comes from the Greek κόμμα, komma, from κόπτειν, to cut.

The semicolon, of course, is the half colon.

The question mark was made by writing the first and last letters of the Latin word questio, a question, vertically, q over o

The exclamation point was made by writing the letters of the Latin word Io, joy, vertically, I over o

The punctuation marks now in use and treated of in this book are as follows:

Other important marks used by printers, but not, strictly speaking, marks of punctuation, are fully discussed in the volume on Abbreviations and Signs (No. 37) in this series.

There are two systems of punctuation in use, known respectively as the close and open systems. The close, or stiff, system, using points wherever they can be used, is of importance in precise composition of every sort, such as laws, contracts, legal and ecclesiastical statements, and the like. The open, or easy, system, omitting points wherever they can be omitted, is used generally in the commoner forms of composition. The tendency, sometimes pushed too far, is toward an extremely open style of punctuation. The general attitude of writers and printers may be summed up by saying that you must justify the use of a punctuation mark, particularly a comma, rather than its omission.

But why should the printer bother himself about punctuation at all? Is that not