nd
sometimes the slanting line (/). A reversed semicolon was used as a
question mark. Wynkyn de Worde, Caxton's successor in the printing
business in London, used five points in 1509. They were the period, the
semicolon, the comma, the "interrogative," and the parenthesis.

The systematization of punctuation is due mainly to the careful and
scholarly Aldus Manutius, who had opened a printing office in Venice in
1494. The great printers of the early day were great scholars as well.
For a very long time the chief concern of the printer was the opening of
the treasures of ancient thought to the world. They were therefore
compelled to be the students, critics, and editors of the old
manuscripts which served them as copy. They naturally took their
punctuation from the Greek grammarians, but sometimes with changed
meanings. The semicolon, for instance, is the Greek mark of
interrogation.

The period took its name from the Greek word [Greek: periodos],
periodos, meaning a division of a sentence or a thought, as we to-day
speak of an orator's eloquent periods.

The colon comes from the Greek [Greek: kolon], kolon, meaning a limb.

The comma comes from the Greek [Greek: komma], komma, from [Greek:
koptein], to cut.

The semicolon, of course, is the half colon.

The question mark was made by writing the first and last letters of the
Latin word _questio_, a question, vertically, [Symbol: q over o]

The exclamation point was made by writing the letters of the Latin word
_Io_, joy, vertically, [Symbol: I over o]

The punctuation marks now in use and treated of in this book are as
follows:

, comma
; semicolon
: colon
. period
? interrogation
! exclamation
( ) parentheses
[ ] brackets
' apostrophe
- hyphen
-- dash
" " quotation marks

Other important marks used by printers, but not, strictly speaking,
marks of punctuation, are fully discussed in the volume on
_Abbreviations and Signs_ (No. 37) in this series.

There are two systems of punctuation in use, known respectively as the
close and open systems. The close, or stiff, system, using points
wherever they can be used, is of importance in precise composition of
every sort, such as laws, contracts, legal and ecclesiastical
statements, and the like. The open, or easy, system, omitting points
wherever they can be omitted, is used generally in the commoner forms of
composition. The tendency, sometimes pushed too far, is toward an
ext