We'd like to use analytics cookies to understand which symbols people look up, so we know what to research next. They are not used for advertising and we set none of them unless you say yes. What we store.
Text the editor adds because the ancient writer left it out.
Also known as: Pointed brackets, Arrow brackets in an inscription
Pointed brackets mark the editor correcting the scribe, not the damage. The object is intact at that point and simply wrong — a dropped letter, a skipped word — and the supply is a judgement about the writer rather than about the stone.
Angle brackets enclosing letters or words the editor adds because the ancient writer omitted them, where the surface itself is undamaged.
Contexts: History
Distinct from square brackets in what it claims. Square brackets say the evidence is gone; angle brackets say the evidence is present and mistaken.
Also used in some editorial traditions for letters the scribe wrote incorrectly rather than omitted, which is one of the points on which editions differ and the preface must be consulted.
Two pointed brackets, each formed of two short lines meeting at a point turned outward, enclosing a span of text.
Both are editorial supply, but square brackets restore lost text and angle brackets add text the scribe omitted.
Angle brackets add what the scribe omitted; braces delete what the scribe wrongly included.