What are the origins of the Scruple Sign (℈)?
Asked by
FnuLnu (
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July 8th, 2021
And why does it look like an E/Е/Є/э/ε/ϵ/Ɛ/Ⲉ?
I could easily find the ethymology as well as the
proportionary values of scruples as weight units,
but can’t quite find any info about the ℈ seen
on the coin-like apothecary scale weights.
I fidgeted with a translator, & thus far I can only hypothesize
that it is simply a reverse letter E standiŋ for
the Spanish “escrupolo”, the Portoguese “escrúpulo”,
or the Catalan “escrúpol”.
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2 Answers
Mmmh…
Nope, ſtill noþiŋ on the scruple sign (℈)...
although I did, get confirm that the lb bar (℔) sign is
a scribal abbreviation for libra aka pound (and apparently
was used to mean money too! Nice!)
Found out the Dram sign is apparently a yogh (Ȝ) rather than a tailed z (ℨ)
... unless the two got mixed up by contemporaries…
or by people at the time [which also happened a lot, the movable types
of the two being often used one in place of the other. That’s also how
”þou”(thou) morphed into “you” ]
... or both…
I also found out via one of those sites that some sources had a Jupiter symbol (♃)
instead of the R with stroke (℞) as a scribal abbreviation for Recipe/Prescription Take…
maybe someone was trying to make an R rotunda(Ꝛ) with a stroke?
Maybe someone did so, and yet an other misinterpreted it?
My only hypothesis for the scruple sign remains that it appeared as a
scribal abbreviation somewhere in the Iberian peninsula, or from
an apothecary hailing from the region – but I lack any preparation,
and this conjecture is mostly built on thin air.
Also, missed opportunity for a semioptics tag… u_u
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