2655: Long S Outside Writing Systems Mar 25, 2022

While naturally the long s ⟨ſ⟩ character was used in handwriting, print, and in ligatures, outside of specific writing systems it’s also had other functions. was the symbol of the shilling when that was part of British currency, though this has largely been replaced with a / symbol. ⟨ſ⟩ is used in mathematics for integrals, though this is a stylized form based on the italicised version /ʃ/, hence the tail at the end and no x-height nub. In the International Phonetic alphabet, the same italicised version /ʃ/ is used to represent the first found in 'SHort'.

This is the final post in a series about the long-s. To read all of them together, click here.