From the ampersat and amerpsand, via smileys and runes to the
ubiquitous presence of mathematical and other symbols in sciences
and technology: both old and modern documents abound with many
familiar as well as lesser known characters, symbols and other
glyphs. Yet, who would be readily able to answer any question like:
'who chose to represent the ratio of a circle's diameter to its
circumference?' or 'what's the reasoning behind having a key on my
computer keyboard?' This book is precisely for those who have
always asked themselves this sort of questions. So, here are the
stories behind one hundred glyphs, the book being evenly divided
into five parts, with each featuring 20 symbols. Part 1, called
Character sketches, looks at some of the glyphs we use in writing.
Part 2, called Signs of the times, discusses some glyphs used in
pol itics, religion, and other areas of everyday life. Some of
these symbols are common; others are used only rarely. Some are
modern inventions; others, which seem contemporary, can be traced
back many hundreds of years. Part 3, called Signs and wonders,
explores some of the symbols people have developed for use in
describing the heavens. These are some of the most visually
striking glyphs in the book, and many of them date back to ancient
times. Nevertheless their use - at least in professional arenas -
is diminishing. Part 4, called It's Greek to me, examines some
symbols used in various branches of science. A number of these
symbols are employed routinely by professional scientists and are
also familiar to the general public; others are no longer applied
in a serious fashion by anyone - but the reader might still meet
them, from time to time, in older works. The final part of the
book, Meaningless marks on paper, looks at some of the characters
used in mathematics, the history of which one can easily appreciate
with only a basic knowledge of mathematics. There are obviously
countless others symbols. In recent years the computing industry
has devel oped Unicode and it currently contains more than 135 000
entries. This book would like to encourage the curious reader to
take a stroll through Unicode, to meet many characters that will
delight the eye and, researching their history, to gain some
fascinating insights.
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