Oscar CunninghamMar 11

It looks like the ⍼ saga has finally ended!

The unicode character '⍼' was a mystery first noticed in 2022: https://ionathan.ch/2022/04/09/angzarr.html. It's in the Unicode standard as a mathematical symbol. But no one could find any examples of it having been used, and no one knew what it represented. It was like the only record of an extinct species, fossilized in the Unicode standard.

But now someone has found the document it originally came from! It represents the angle 'Azimuth', and the symbol probably comes from the path light takes through a sextant. https://ionathan.ch/2026/02/16/angzarr.html

(@johncarlosbaez might appreciate this symbol!)

U+237C ⍼ RIGHT ANGLE WITH DOWNWARDS ZIGZAG ARROW

⟨λ. closure ahead⟩
Show threadPianosaurus 🕴Mar 11
@OscarCunningham @johncarlosbaez Sorry, but this is absolutely not solved. The source listed is a register of symbols, not natural usage. Where did _they_ get it from in 1950? How is it better that it showed up magically there, instead of in unicode directly?
Show threadOscar CunninghamMar 11
@pianosaurus That's true. But it's a big improvement just to know what meaning that register assigned to the symbol!
Show threadPianosaurus 🕴
@OscarCunningham Absolutely. I picked up on the wikipedia edit a few months ago (someone linked it here on Mastodon), and got my hopes up when I saw this now thinking it was more news. Hopefully, the buzz generated around it now will end up uncovering some more info.
Mar 11 at 3:20pmWeb