apostrophe

See also: Apostrophe and apostrophé

English

WOTD – 13 February 2007

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /əˈpɒs.tɹə.fi/
• (US) IPA^(key): /əˈpɑːs.tɹə.fi/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Etymology 1

From French apostrophe, or Latin apostrophus, from Ancient Greek ἀπόστροφος (apóstrophos, “accent of elision”), a noun use of an adjective from ἀποστρέφω (apostréphō, “I turn away”), from ἀπό (apó, “away from”) + στρέφω (stréphō, “to turn”).

Alternative forms

• apostrophë, apostrophy

Noun

apostrophe (plural apostrophes)

1. (orthography) The text character ’, which serves as a punctuation mark in various languages and as a diacritical mark in certain rare contexts.

Usage notes

In English, the apostrophe is used to mark the possessive (e.g. “my friend’s wife”) or to show the omission of letters or numbers (e.g. “my friend’s angry”). See Category:English terms spelled with '.

Derived terms

• greengrocer's apostrophe
• printer's apostrophe
• typewriter apostrophe
• typographic apostrophe

 

Translations

the character ’

• Albanian: apostrof (sq) m
• Armenian: ապաթարց (hy) (apatʿarcʿ)
• Asturian: apóstrofu m
• Azerbaijani: apostrof
• Belarusian: апо́страф m (apóstraf)
• Bengali: ঊর্ধকমা (ūrdhôkma)
• Bulgarian: апостроф (bg) m (apostrof)
• Catalan: apòstrof m
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 省略符號 (zh), 省略符号 (zh) (shěnglüè fúhào), 隔音符號, 隔音符号 (géyīn fúhào), 省字符 (shěngzìfú), 單引號, 单引号 (dānyǐnhào), 撇號 (zh), 撇号 (zh) (piěhào), 頓呼, 顿呼 (dùnhū)

• Cornish: kollverk m, kollverkys m pl
• Czech: apostrof (cs) m
• Danish: apostrof c
• Dutch: weglatingsteken (nl) n, apostrof (nl) f
• Esperanto: apostrofo (eo)
• Estonian: ülakoma (et)
• Finnish: heittomerkki (fi)
• French: apostrophe (fr) f
• Galician: apóstrofo m
• Georgian: აპოსტროფი (aṗosṭropi)
• German: Apostroph (de) m, Hochkomma n
• Greek: απόστροφος (el) f (apóstrofos)

  Ancient: ἀπόστροφος f (apóstrophos)

• Hungarian: aposztróf (hu), hiányjel (hu)
• Icelandic: úrfellingarmerki n
• Ido: apostrofo (io)
• Ilocano: tuldek
• Interlingua: apostropho
• Interlingue: apostrof
• Irish: uaschamóg f, apastróf f
• Italian: apostrofo (it) m
• Japanese: アポストロフィー (ja) (aposutorofī), アポストロフ (ja) (aposutorofu), 省略符号 (しょうりゃくふごう, shōryaku fugō)

• Kazakh: апостроф (apostrof)
• Korean: 아포스트로피 (aposeuteuropi)
• Kyrgyz: апостроф (ky) (apostrof)
• Latin: apostrophus f
• Latvian: apostrofs m
• Lithuanian: apostrofa m
• Luxembourgish: Apostroph m
• Macedonian: апостроф m (apostrof)
• Manx: apostrophee
• Maori: pakini
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: apostrof m

  Nynorsk: apostrof m

• Persian: آپوستروف‎ (fa) (âpostrof)
• Polish: apostrof (pl) m
• Portuguese: apóstrofo (pt) m
• Romanian: apostrof (ro) n
• Russian: апо́стро́ф (ru) m (apóstróf)
• Scottish Gaelic: ascair m, asgair m
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: а̀построф m, изо̀ставник m

  Latin: àpostrof (sh) m, izòstavnik (sh) m

• Slovak: apostrof m
• Slovene: opuščaj (sl) m, apostrof (sl) m
• Spanish: apóstrofo (es) m
• Swedish: apostrof (sv)
• Tagalog: kudlit
• Tajik: апостроф (apostrof)
• Thai: อะพอสทรอฟี (à-pɔ̂ɔs-trɔɔ-fii)
• Ukrainian: апостроф (uk) m (apostrof)
• Uzbek: apostrof (uz)
• Vietnamese: dấu lược
• Welsh: collnod m, sillgoll f

See also

• apostrophe on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Punctuation

• apostrophe ( ' ) ( ’ )
• braces ( { } )
• brackets ( [ ] )
• colon ( : )
• comma ( , )

• dashes ( ‒ ) ( – ) ( — ) ( ― )
• ellipsis ( … )
• exclamation mark ( ! )
• fraction slash ( ⁄ )
• guillemets ( « » ) ( ‹ › )

• hyphen ( - ) ( ‐ )
• interpunct ( · )
• interrobang (rare) ( ‽ )
• parentheses ( ( ) )
• period (US) or full stop (UK) ( . )

• question mark ( ? )
• quotation marks (formal) ( ‘ ’ ‚ ) ( “ ” „ )
• quotation marks (informal, Computing) ( " ) ( ' )

• semicolon ( ; )
• slash (US) or stroke (UK) ( / )
• space (   )

Etymology 2

From Latin apostrophe, from Ancient Greek ἀποστροφή (apostrophḗ), from ἀποστρέφω (apostréphō, “I turn away”), from ἀπό (apó) + στρέφω (stréphō, “I turn”).

Noun

apostrophe (countable and uncountable, plural apostrophes)

1. (rhetoric) A sudden exclamatory piece of dialogue addressed to someone or something, especially absent.
   • [1835, L[arret] Langley, A Manual of the Figures of Rhetoric, […], Doncaster: Printed by C. White, Baxter-Gate, OCLC 1062248511, page 28:

     Apostrophe a bold digression makes,
     Mov'd by some sudden thought the theme awakes.]

Derived terms

• apostrophically

Related terms

• catastrophe

Translations

sudden piece of dialogue

• Armenian: ապաթարց (hy) (apatʿarcʿ)
• Asturian: apóstrofe f
• Bulgarian: апостроф (bg) m (apostrof)
• Catalan: apòstrofe m
• Czech: apostrofa ?
• Danish: apostrofe c
• Dutch: apostrof (nl) f
• Finnish: apostrofi (fi)
• French: apostrophe (fr) f
• Galician: apóstrofe f
• Greek: αποστροφή (el) f (apostrofí)

• Interlingua: apostrophe
• Irish: aitheasc m, apastróf f
• Macedonian: апостро́фа f (apostrófa)
• Polish: apostrofa (pl) f
• Portuguese: apóstrofe (pt) f
• Romanian: apostrof (ro) n
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: апо̀строфа f

  Roman: apòstrofa (sh) f

• Spanish: apóstrofe (es) m or f
• Swedish: apostrof (sv) ?

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French

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /a.pɔs.tʁɔf/
• Homophones: apostrophent, apostrophes

• Audio

  (file)

Etymology 1

From Latin apostrophus, from Ancient Greek ἀπόστροφος (apóstrophos, “accent of elision”), a noun use of an adjective from ἀποστρέφω (apostréphō, “I turn away”).

Noun

apostrophe f (plural apostrophes)

1. (orthography) apostrophe

Etymology 2

From Latin apostrophe, from Ancient Greek ἀποστροφή (apostrophḗ), from ἀποστρέφω (apostréphō, “I turn away”), from ἀπό (apó) + στρέφω (stréphō, “I turn”).

Noun

apostrophe f (plural apostrophes)

1. (rhetoric) apostrophe

Related terms

• apostropher

Etymology 3

See the etymology of the main entry.

Verb

apostrophe

1. first/third-person singular present indicative of apostropher
2. first/third-person singular present subjunctive of apostropher
3. second-person singular imperative of apostropher

Further reading

• “apostrophe” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).