punctuation

• POS: Noun
• HYPHEN: punc=tu=a=tion

CIDE DICTIONARY

punctuation, n. [Cf. F. ponctuation.].

 The act or art of punctuating or pointing a writing or discourse; the art or mode of dividing literary composition into sentences, and members of a sentence, by means of points, so as to elucidate the author's meaning.  [1913 Webster]
" Punctuation, as the term is usually understood, is chiefly performed with four points: the period [.], the colon [:], the semicolon [;], and the comma [,]. Other points used in writing and printing, partly rhetorical and partly grammatical, are the note of interrogation [?], the note of exclamation [!], the parentheses [()], the dash [--], and brackets []. It was not until the 16th century that an approach was made to the present system of punctuation by the Manutii of Venice. With Caxton, oblique strokes took the place of commas and periods."  [1913 Webster]

OXFORD DICTIONARY

punctuation, n.
1 the system or arrangement of marks used to punctuate a written passage.
2 the practice or skill of punctuating.

Idiom

punctuation mark any of the marks (e.g. full stop and comma) used in writing to separate sentences and phrases etc. and to clarify meaning.

Etymology

med.L punctuatio (as PUNCTUATE)

THESAURUS

punctuation

alphabet, ampersand, angle brackets, apostrophe, braces, colon, comma, dash, decimal point, diacritical mark, diagonal, dot, ellipsis, end stop, exclamation mark, full stop, hyphen, letter, parens, parentheses, period, point, punctuation marks, question mark, quotation marks, quotes, reference, reference mark, semicolon, single quotes, solidus, stop, tittle, virgule, writing system, written character

ROGET THESAURUS

punctuation

Grammar

N grammar, accidence, syntax, praxis, punctuation, parts of speech, jussive, syllabication, inflection, case, declension, conjugation, us et norma loquendi, Lindley Murray, correct style, philology.