Paragraphs story

The red line is a well-known typographic technique, which is taught at the very first lessons in elementary school. Attach a hand to the notebook and retreat a distance of about two fingers, thereby indicating the beginning of a new paragraph, a new thought of the author. What could be simpler? In fact, this element has an extensive and interesting history.

Long ago, before the invention of printing by the famous Gutenberg, there already existed a way to designate in the text where one thought of the author ends and another begins. This method had nothing to do with the way paragraphs are now used in books. No indentation at the beginning of the line existed, just as there was no transfer to a new line at all. The text was a solid wall, and the gap was shown by a special symbol, which, perhaps, was seen by all who ever used Microsoft Word.

¶

Line transfer, carriage return, paragraph sign, alinea — the weird Pilcrow icon (Unicode 0x00B6) is now called in every way, and it's hardly anyone's guess that this is not an invention of the Word, but a sign with almost a thousand-year history. The shape of the sign originates from the letter C, the first letter of the Latin word capitulum — chapter. As far as the author knows, the sign was finally formed in 1400-1450, and was transformed approximately as follows:

The modern sign of § is a modified version of this original icon, which was placed inside the line and stood out in color, indicating the beginning of a new semantic group of sentences. Before the invention of printing, the sign was written into the books manually by a separate person, a rubricator. Book of King of Alfonso X, 13th century:

At the end of the Middle Ages, the paragraphs began to be written from a new line, and the way to put the icon disappeared not immediately. It was traditionally put at the beginning of the line. Opera Vergiliana & Anais Vergiliiana, 1517:

A paragraph was placed at the beginning of the line and was highlighted, as a rule, in red. Hence the roots of at least two concepts grow: a red line and a rubrica. The word "rubrica" comes from the Latin word rubrum — red. Here, too, lies the origin of the name of the profession of the rubricator, as a person marking the headings in the text.

Where did this sign disappear, why now it is not found in the texts? And this is a wonderful example of a hole from a donut :-) The sign disappeared, and the place for it remains. The work of the rubricator was carried out after the main text of the book was written, and the compositor specially left a place for the inscription of this sign. However, for some reason, the sign was not fit always, and in the end it was the only indentation at the beginning of the line.

In fact, without writing this sign in the proper place for him, lazy medieval booksellers gave the world the best and most obvious way of marking the paragraph – a small indent on the first line. Since then, this method is used everywhere, and the "holes" in the beginning of the chapters seem to wait for an hour, when they are finally filled with the hand of the rubricator.