Mondo Knows Facts
The dot on a lowercase i has its own name
It is called a tittle, from the Latin titulus
The small dot over the lowercase letter i and letter j is officially called a tittle. The term originates from the Latin word titulus, meaning an inscription or heading. In typography, it serves as a tiny diacritic mark to distinguish the letter clearly from surrounding vertical strokes.
Where this comes from
Facts that can change over time are reviewed and updated. If something here looks wrong, Mondo would rather know than be confidently incorrect.
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Tags: language, typography, letters
The dot on a lowercase i has its own name: the short answers
- Where does this come from, and can I check it?
- It is called a tittle, from the Latin titulus. The figure is taken from Oxford English Dictionary, which is linked in full on this page. Every fact on Mondo Knows names its source rather than repeating an unsourced claim.
- Is this really a everyday life fact?
- Yes. It sits on the Everyday Life shelf, one of 1,090 sourced facts grouped into space, animals, the human body, history, science and more. Category pages collect every fact in the same field.
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