Talk:Hebrew punctuation

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A fact from Hebrew punctuation appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know column on 12 June 2008, and was viewed approximately 837 times (disclaimer) (check views). The text of the entry was as follows: Did you know... that although both Hebrew and Arabic texts are written from right to left, the question mark is mirrored in Arabic (؟) but not in Hebrew punctuation? A record of the entry may be seen at Wikipedia:Recent additions/2008/June.

This could not be more incorrect, and in fact HeWiki had a featured article on this subject recently (link). There are a number of Biblical internal punctuation marks. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 15:35, 9 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

A sefer torah has no puncuation (ex. here). The puncuation system orignates in the 7th-11th centuries CE with the Masoretes. Is any of those punctuation marks not covered in the page currently? (talk) 04:38, 10 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I was just saying that the statement was misleading - the Biblical marks are indeed covered (although I'd use images instead of unicode, because they appear as boxes on my setup). I'm not an expert on Biblical subjects, but the Hebrew Wikipedia says that the Biblical punctuation marks were likely developed long before the 7th-11th centuries. However, it says that they first appeared officially in the 7th-8th century. I just think this needs to be clarified. Perhaps you can check with other sources? I don't know any reliable ones personally. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 18:13, 10 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I softed the comment a lot. I can put pictures next to the unicode in its own column (and still get to keep the unicode this way — plus newer config.'s shouldn't have this issue). Which unicode can't you see (maybe just MARK UPPER DOT and cantillation marks)? Epson291 (talk) 07:19, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, those are the ones I can't see. The mark upper dot isn't important, but it's a problem when a user can't see an entire section's worth of marks. By the way, I don't think the descriptions for the punctuation should be in all-caps. -- Ynhockey ^(Talk) 13:00, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I added a picture for the cantillation marks. I didn't have the time to do 30 seperate images though. It's in all-caps only for the reason that it is the names directly from Unicode.Epson291 (talk) 17:23, 13 June 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I'd like to expand the "Geresh and Gershayim" section, but first I want to be sure that I am correct. It seems to me that it is simplistic and incorrect to say that the geresh is always for abbreviations, and that the gershayim is always for acronyms. I think the distinction is in whether the resulting bunch of letters is only a single letter (which would use the geresh) or two or more letters (which would use the gershayim). The example I would use is dalet-resh for "doctor". This is clearly an abbreviation, not an acronym, yet is uses the gershayim. What do others think? Am I wrong? Are there better examples? --Keeves (talk) 04:59, 24 June 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Hey there Keeves,

1. There exist already extended articles for Geresh and Gershayim.
2. A geresh denotes an abbreviation of one word, gershayim of two or more; "ד״ר" is one exception to this rule, see The Academy of the Hebrew Language website, section ראשי תיבות. A geresh denotes also initialisms consisting of more than one letter, e.g. וכו׳, וכד׳, וגו׳, לכ׳, גב׳. When denoting numerals, your distinction in correct: geresh for single-letter numerals, gershayim for numerals with more than one. Dan ☺ 17:36, 2 July 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Does Hebrew use em dashes similar to usage in English?--64.198.141.194 (talk) 19:07, 25 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Apart from the fundamental distinction between the binding agent maqaf ("־") and a separating dash, the Academy of the Hebrew Language doesn't seem to differentiate between different kinds of dashes (see here). Dan ☺ 12:35, 26 August 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Why would the paragraph

The maqaf (־) is the Hebrew hyphen (-), and has virtually the same purpose for connecting two words as in English. It is different from the hyphen in its positioning (a hyphen is in the middle in terms of height, the maqaf is at the top) and it has a biblical[clarification needed][citation needed] origin, unlike many other Modern Hebrew punctuation symbols, which have simply been imported from European languages.

need any citation or clarification? This is common sense.—Gniw (Wing) (talk) 21:49, 19 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

True. What's missing isn't a clarification of the above but information about the different functions of the biblical maqaf (of which I personally only have a vague idea). Dan ☺ 23:26, 19 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Other web resources suggest that quotations marks style is either ”olleH„ or ”olleH” rather than “olleH„ or “olleH” (using the other direction of the closing quotation mark with both opening styles). This article does not make that detail explicit. Can anyone clarify please? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Towopedia (talk • contribs) 09:45, 6 December 2013 (UTC)[reply]

You are right, Towopedia. Older printed material usually uses ”olleH„ or ”olleH”. It went out of fashion in books around 1980s and in newspapers around 2005. The „ mark never appeared on computer keyboards until Windows 8, and Microsoft Word's didn't use it for it's auto-styling. Today it appears in some blogs of people who like typography (such as yours-truly's) and I occasionally see it revived in advertisements, but almost never in print.

“olleH„ appears in some older printed books, but is much rarer than ”olleH„.

“olleH” mostly appears in texts that are auto-typeset by unscrupulous software that applies English rules to Hebrew, such as Microsoft Word and some older versions of WordPress. --Amir E. Aharoni (talk) 05:23, 6 July 2014 (UTC)[reply]