What is the Symbol for "Section"?

[tony873004]

I have no idea which forum this question should go in, so feel free to move it, mods.

But I am looking at an astronomy paper containing this symbol, so I'll ask here.

What is that symbol that is used to mean "section"? For example:

"The relative light curves of XN Mus 1991 were derived in the manner described in (symbol here) 2."

meaning "described in section 2." It looks sort of like an sos except vertical. I've seen it in different subjects, not just astronomy. I don't think its greek. What is it called and what font contains it?

 

[SpaceTiger]

Is this what you're looking for:

$$\S$$

It's \S in latex mode. I don't know what font contains it.

 

[tony873004]

Thanks, ST. That's the one.

I'd love to know what it's called so I can Google it and find a font for use it in some stuff I'm typing. I don't have latex software. This forum is my only exposure to tex. I use Equation Editor and Math Type, but I can't find the symbol there.

 

[marcus]

Thanks, ST. That's the one.

I'd love to know what it's called so I can Google it and find a font for use it in some stuff I'm typing. I don't have latex software. This forum is my only exposure to tex. I use Equation Editor and Math Type, but I can't find the symbol there.

my personal take on that symbol is that it is two ESSES
arranged vertically
and that it is analogous to the paragraph symbol which looks like a backwards cap P
with two verticals----or like two capital Ps superimposed or overstruck

so reverse-P for paragraph and that odd double-S for section

[t ex]\P[/t ex]

$$\P$$

[t ex]\S[/t ex]

$$\S$$

 

[tony873004]

§
Found it! I still don't know what font this is, maybe most fonts contain it, but at least it's not locked inside latex, so I can copy and paste it. It's HTML entity is § It's unicode hex is U+00A7. It's unicode range is Latin-supplement 1, and its unicode name is "section symbol".

learned something new :)

 

[marcus]

§
Found it! I still don't know what font this is, maybe most fonts contain it, but at least it's not locked inside latex, so I can copy and paste it. It's HTML entity is § It's unicode hex is U+00A7. It's unicode range is Latin-supplement 1, and its unicode name is "section symbol".

learned something new :)

your non-latex version looks even more to me like
two ESSES hooked together, one dangling from the other

so I don't think it is right to describe it as "S o S", as you did earlier. I could easily be wrong but I don't think the middle thing is a circle or a letter o, it could be just where the hooks engage.

 

[tony873004]

...so I don't think it is right to describe it as "S o S", as you did earlier...

I did say "sort of"

ST's version has more of the "o" in the middle, while my "non-latex" version seems to support your double-s theory.

In any case, I think it would make a cool logo for a baseball cap.