Section sign

The silcrow (Unicode U+00A7 § SECTION SIGN, HTML §, TeX \S) is a typographical character used mainly to refer to a particular section of a document, such as a legal code. It is also called "double S" and "sectional symbol".

The likely origin of the section sign is the digraph formed by the combination of two S glyphs (from the Latin signum sectiōnis). When duplicated, as §§, it is read as the plural "sections" (e.g. "§§ 13–21"), much as "pp." (pages) is the plural of "p."

It is frequently used along with the pilcrow (¶), or paragraph sign. Like the dagger (†) and double dagger (‡), it is also sometimes used to link to a footnote where the asterisk (*) is already in use on a given page.

It is common practice to follow the section sign with a non-breaking space, just before the actual section being cited.

Typing character

• RFC 1345 mnemonic: SE
• Linux iBus RFC 1345 entry method: SE&
• Emacs: C-x 8 S
• Vim, in insert mode: Ctrl+K SE or Ctrl+V 167
• Windows
  • AZERTY keyboard layout: § key
  • QWERTZ keyboard layout: ⇧ Shift+3
    • German keyboard layout: § key
  • Finnish/Swedish QWERTY keyboard layout: § key
  • Alt code (on numeric keypad):
    • Alt+0167 ANSI
    • Alt+21 OEM
    • Alt++A7 Unicode
• Mac OS
  • ES keyboard layout: ⌥ Opt+K
  • BE/UK/FI/SE keyboard layout: § key
  • US keyboard layout: ⌥ Opt+6
  • US extended keyboard layout: ⌥ Opt+5
  • CSA keyboard layout: ⌥ Opt+⇧ Shift+S
• X Window System (Unix/Linux)
  • Compose+S+O
    • Ubuntu: AltGr+⇧ Shift SO
    • Kubuntu: US-International keyboard layout/UK-International keyboard layout: AltGr+⇧ Shift+S
  • GTK+ also Compose+!+S, but produces Ṣ elsewhere
  • Ctrl+⇧ Shift+U00A7
    • Ubuntu: Ctrl+⇧ Shift+UA7↵ Enter
• iOS: 123, hold & until alternative § is displayed

See also

• Scilicet

External links

• Media related to Section signs at Wikimedia Commons
• The dictionary definition of Section signs at Wiktionary