punctuation

English

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punctuation

Etymology

Borrowed from Medieval Latin punctuātiō (“a marking with points, a writing, agreement”), from punctuō (“to mark with points, settle”). Morphologically, punctuate +‎ -ion.

Pronunciation

IPA^(key): /pʌŋk.t͡ʃuˈeɪ.ʃən/
Rhymes: -eɪʃən
Audio (Southern England): (file)

Noun

punctuation (countable and uncountable, plural punctuations)

A set of symbols and marks which are used to clarify meaning in text by separating strings of words into clauses, phrases and sentences; examples include commas, hyphens, and stops (periods).
Different languages have different rules for punctuation.
An act of punctuating.

Meronyms

see an extensive list of such marks at Thesaurus:punctuation mark

Derived terms

Related terms

Punctuation

apostrophe ( ' ) ( ’ )
curly brackets or braces (US) ( { } )
square brackets or brackets (US) ( [ ] )
colon ( : )
comma ( , )
dashes ( ‒ ) ( – ) ( — ) ( ― )
ellipsis ( … )
exclamation mark ( ! )
fraction slash ( ⁄ )
guillemets ( « » ) ( ‹ › )
hyphen ( - ) ( ‐ )
interpunct ( · )
interrobang (rare) ( ‽ )
brackets or parentheses (US, Canada) ( ( ) )
full stop or period (US, Canada) ( . )
question mark ( ? )
quotation marks (formal) ( ‘ ’ ‚ ) ( “ ” „ )
quotation marks (informal, computing) ( " ) ( ' )
semicolon ( ; )
slash or stroke (UK) ( / )
space ( ] [ )

Translations

set of symbols

Afrikaans: punktuasie
Arabic: عَلَامَة تَرْقِيم f (ʕalāmat tarqīm), تَرْقِيم m (tarqīm)
Egyptian Arabic: علامة ترقيم f (ʔalamet tarqim), ترقيم m (tarqim)
Armenian: կետադրություն (hy) (ketadrutʻyun)
Asturian: puntuación f
Azerbaijani: punktuasiya, durğu işarələri
Basque: puntuazio anim
Belarusian: пунктуа́цыя f (punktuácyja)
Bulgarian: пунктуа́ция (bg) f (punktuácija)
Burmese: အဖြတ်အတောက် (my) (a.hprat-a.tauk)
Catalan: puntuació (ca) f
Chinese:
Mandarin: 標點／标点 (zh) (biāodiǎn), 句讀／句读 (zh) (jùdòu)
Czech: interpunkce f
Danish: tegnsætning (da) c
Dutch: interpunctie (nl)
Esperanto: interpunkcio
Estonian: kirjavahemärgid, vahemärgid
Finnish: välimerkit (fi) pl
French: ponctuation (fr) f
Galician: puntuación (gl) f
Georgian: პუნქტუაცია (ka) (ṗunkṭuacia)
German: Satzzeichen (de) f, Interpunktion (de) f, Zeichensetzung (de) f
Greek: στίξη (el) f (stíxi)
Ancient: στίξις f (stíxis) (Byzantine)
Gujarati: વિરામચિહ્નો (virāmcihno)
Hindi: विराम चिह्न (virām cihna)
Hungarian: központozás (hu)
Icelandic: greinarmerki (is)
Ido: puntizado (io)
Indonesian: tanda baca (id)
Irish: poncaíocht (ga)
Italian: punteggiatura (it) f, interpunzione (it) f
Japanese: 句読点 (ja) (くとうてん, kutōten), (generic, includes diacritics) 約物 (ja) (やくもの, yakumono)
Javanese: please add this translation if you can
Khmer: វណ្ណយុត្ត (km) (voann’yut)
Korean: 문장 부호 (munjang buho)
Lao: please add this translation if you can
Latvian: interpunkcija f
Lithuanian: skyryba (lt) f
Macedonian: интерпункција f (interpunkcija)
Malay: tanda baca (ms)
Malayalam: please add this translation if you can
Maltese: punteġġjatura f
Maori: tohutuhi
Marathi: विरामचिन्हे (virāmcinhe)
Norwegian: please add this translation if you can
Bokmål: tegnsetting

Nynorsk: please add this translation if you can
Persian: نشانه‌های سجاوندی (fa) (nešâne-hâ-ye sajâvandi), خوانشنویسه
Polish: interpunkcja (pl) f, przestankowanie n
Portuguese: pontuação (pt) f
Romanian: punctuație (ro) f
Russian: пунктуа́ция (ru) f (punktuácija), зна́ки препина́ния m pl (znáki prepinánija), препина́ние (ru) n (prepinánije)
Scottish Gaelic: pungadh m
Serbo-Croatian:
Cyrillic: интерпункција f, пунктуација f, разгодак m

Roman: interpunkcija (sh) f, punktuacija (sh) f, razgodak (sh) m
Slovak: interpunkcia f
Slovene: ločílo (sl) n, interpunkcija f
Spanish: puntuación (es) f
Swedish: skiljetecken (sv)
Tagalog: palabantasan
Tamil: நிறுத்தக்குறிகள் (niṟuttakkuṟikaḷ)
Telugu: విరామ చిహ్నములు (virāma cihnamulu)
Thai: เครื่องหมายวรรคตอน (th) (krʉ̂ʉang-mǎai-wák-dtɔɔn), วรรคตอน (spacing, used in Thai)
Turkish: noktalama (tr)
Ukrainian: пунктуа́ція f (punktuácija)
Urdu: رموز اوقاف
Uzbek: punktuatsiya (uz)
Vietnamese: chấm câu (vi)
Welsh: atalnodi (cy)
Yiddish: please add this translation if you can
Zulu: please add this translation if you can

act

Finnish: välimerkitys, välimerkittäminen
German: Zeichensetzung (de) f
Hungarian: központozás (hu)
Persian: خوانشنویسش
Tagalog: pagbabantas