Ampersands & Their Sordid Past
Created | Updated Feb 21, 2005
Ampersands are one of those useful oddities of the English language one occasionally trips over, especially in older texts. Today, it is taken for granted that it is a synonym for the word 'and' in most titles. But much of the personal life of this fine mark has been lost to the modern reader.
The ampersand (&) began its life simply enough. It was originally the Latin word 'Et', which of course is translated into English as 'and'. Note carefully the shape of the character '&' and you will see that it sort of looks like a cursive version of the word 'Et'. This is where it all begins. Suddenly, some lazy, or sloppy fellow, (maybe he was pressed for time?) quickly writes 'Et' in his Latin journal or prayer book, or what have you, and it ends up looking like '&'.
Later in the ampersand's quest for meaning, some other fellow gets lazy, and instead of calling the '&' by its Latin name, 'Et', he refers to it as 'and'.
In the meantime, the printing press was invented. Those clever typesetters, always looking for another way to save time, decided it was easier to use two letters, 'Et', instead of three, 'and'. But using even two letters meant that two blocks would have to be set up on the press. So, in his further cleverness, one printer decided it would be a good idea to create a single character block combining the 'E' and the 't' into a '&'
So this is how the ampersand gained its shape. Now, the next question is, how exactly did the ampersand get its name?
In America, as in other English-speaking places on the globe, school children are taught their alphabet by rote. In 19th Century America, however, in addition to the standard twenty-six letters of the English alphabet, there were three other characters recited. The typical recitation would be performed as follows: 'A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z, A per se A, I per se I, & per se &.'
The purpose of these odd repetitions of the letters A and I was to point out to school children that each of these two letters could stand as separate words, per se. The '& per se &' was a reference to our friend, the ampersand, standing as a single character. From this recitation, the words 'and per se and' were eventually slurred together, and hence the 'andperseand' got its name, in much the same way that LMNOP is quickly becoming one letter.
The ampersand (&) began its life simply enough. It was originally the Latin word 'Et', which of course is translated into English as 'and'. Note carefully the shape of the character '&' and you will see that it sort of looks like a cursive version of the word 'Et'. This is where it all begins. Suddenly, some lazy, or sloppy fellow, (maybe he was pressed for time?) quickly writes 'Et' in his Latin journal or prayer book, or what have you, and it ends up looking like '&'.
Later in the ampersand's quest for meaning, some other fellow gets lazy, and instead of calling the '&' by its Latin name, 'Et', he refers to it as 'and'.
In the meantime, the printing press was invented. Those clever typesetters, always looking for another way to save time, decided it was easier to use two letters, 'Et', instead of three, 'and'. But using even two letters meant that two blocks would have to be set up on the press. So, in his further cleverness, one printer decided it would be a good idea to create a single character block combining the 'E' and the 't' into a '&'
So this is how the ampersand gained its shape. Now, the next question is, how exactly did the ampersand get its name?
In America, as in other English-speaking places on the globe, school children are taught their alphabet by rote. In 19th Century America, however, in addition to the standard twenty-six letters of the English alphabet, there were three other characters recited. The typical recitation would be performed as follows: 'A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z, A per se A, I per se I, & per se &.'
The purpose of these odd repetitions of the letters A and I was to point out to school children that each of these two letters could stand as separate words, per se. The '& per se &' was a reference to our friend, the ampersand, standing as a single character. From this recitation, the words 'and per se and' were eventually slurred together, and hence the 'andperseand' got its name, in much the same way that LMNOP is quickly becoming one letter.
