What the *@#!?: Asterisk

What the *@#!? is an ongoing exploration of the origins and meanings of the symbols we use everyday. This post is about The Asterisk. We use it in footnotes, math and even music but where does this little star come from?

An asterisk: Late Latin: asteriscus, from Greek: ἀστερίσκος, asteriskos, “little star” is a typographical symbol or glyph. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often pronounce it as star (as, for example, in the A* search algorithm or C*-algebra). In English, an asterisk is usually five-pointed in sans-serif typefaces, six-pointed in serif typefaces, and six- or eight-pointed when handwritten.

The asterisk is derived from the need of the printers of family trees in feudal times for a symbol to indicate date of birth. The original shape was seven-armed, each arm like a teardrop shooting from the center. For this reason, in some computer circles it is called a splat, perhaps due to the “squashed-bug” appearance of the asterisk on many early line printers.

Many cultures have their own unique versions of the asterisk. In computer science, the asterisk is commonly used as a wildcard character, or to denote pointers, repetition, and multiplication.

Read more about it at the asterisk wiki »

Jan 12 : Design 1