&: A False Origin Story
mpl...@my-deja.com
least mostly false, as I will explain later in this message.
From _The Facts on File Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins, Revised
and Expanded Edition,_ by Robert Hendrickson, © 1997:
<quote>
*& (ampersand).* The symbol & was invented by Marcus Tullius Tiro, who
introduced it about 63 B.C. as part of the first system of shorthand of
which there is any record. A learned Roman freeman & amanuensis to
Cicero, Tiro invented his "Tironian notes" to take down his friend's
fluent dictation, but he also used it to write works of his own,
including some of the great orator's speeches & even some of Cicero's
letters to Tiro! His system was based on the orthographic principle &
made abundant use of initials, the & sign that was part of it being a
contraction for the Latin _et_ or "and." Tiro's shorthand system was
taught in Roman schools, used to record speeches in the Senate, & saw
wide use among businessmen in Europe for almost a thousand years.
</quote>
I first encountered this origin story in the first edition of
Hendrickson's book, © 1987. Ever since, when the subject of the
ampersand came up, I would mention the Tironian notes connection. It was
not until this year that I learned the truth.
I am prompted to post this message because just the other day I came
upon another version of this false origin story.
The following is from _The Alphabet Abecedarium: Some Notes on Letters_
by Richard A. Firmage, © 1993:
<quote from page 284>
Let us begin with the & (ampersand) sign itself--one of the most
widespread international abbreviations. It is said to have been devised
in 63 B.C. by Marcus Tiro as part of his 500 Tironian Notes or shorthand
system. According to William Mason, it is actually a ligature combining
the letters of the Latin word _et_ ("and").
</quote>
When I tried to verify the Tironian notes story, I first found a book
which listed Latin words and gave their Tironian notes form. The
translation for _et_ did not look anything like &. Rather, it was
composed of two straight lines and looked something like the mirror
image of a capital Greek gamma.
Fortunately for me, the Wilson Library at the University of Minnesota
had the book _Formenwandlungen der Et-Zeichen_[1] by Jan Tschichold,
published by D. Stempelag in Frankfurt-am-Main, and its English
translation _The Ampersand: Its Origin and Development,_ translated by
Frederick Plaat, published by Woudhuysen and Company Limited, London.
Although no date was given on the German version, the English version,
dated 1957, says the original version was first published in 1953.
<quote from page 5 of the English version>
The history of these signs [ligatures] is almost as old as that of the
roman hand. It is true that ampersands occur neither in any antique
roman inscriptions nor in the monumental majuscule hands of the Romans.
But as early as 79 AD we meet in the more hasty _graffiti_--hurriedly
scraped inscriptions--a ligature _et_ (Fig 1) which may perhaps be
called the ancestor of the ampersand family. Though in this example the
centre stroke of the E merely touches the stem of the T, Fig 2 (171 AD)
taken from an old Roman cursive hand and shorter by only one stroke has
already become an ampersand which fully conforms with our definition.
The centre stroke of the E simultaneously constitutes the horizontal of
the T.
<page 7 and 20>
A special group among the ampersands (49-96) has its origin neither in
the original Roman letters E and T, nor in their minuscule form, e and
t; it originates in a logogram from the Tironian Notes. The old Romans
used a form of shorthand to record speeches, which they themselves
called _notae,_ which was invented almost entirely by a certain Marcus
Tullius Tiro (103-4 BC) a freedman and companion of the orator, Cicero.
The form of the Tironian Notes has nothing to do with the Roman
alphabet. They consist of lines of a uniform thickness, slants,
horizontals, and perpendiculars being carefully differentiated. The word
or syllable _et_ was in the form of a perpendicular right angle with
limbs of equal length and without special endings(49).
During the Middle Ages the Tironian Notes fell into oblivion. Only a few
learned monks and notaries continued to use them.... But a few of the
Tironian Notes were in general use as abbreviations, among them...a
reversed c, for the syllable _con,_ and the old _et_ logogram. Thus we
find the Tironic sign for _et_ in a few hands of the Middle Ages; but
the letter form & and the Tironian sign do not appear to have been used
side by side in the same hand.
</quote>
Conclusion: While Hendrickson's and Firmage's books lead one to believe
that the ampersand currently in use (&), which is a ligature of the
Latin word _et,_ was created by Marcus Tiro, in fact, the _et_ logogram
of the Tironian Notes was used by relatively few, and is not derived
from the Roman alphabet.
Note
[1]On the title page of the original version, the title appears as
_Formenwandlungen der &-Zeichen._
--
Raymond S. Wise
Email: mplsrayPl...@yahoo.com
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