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A cross before a date meaning the person died then.
Also known as: Cross before a death date, Dagger before a date
The dagger marking a death date. Its use is contested: applying a cross derived from Christian iconography to people of other faiths has been publicly objected to, and some publishers now avoid it.
A cross or dagger placed before a date to state that the person died on it, in the same position an English text would write d. or died.
Contexts: History
Its use for people who were not Christian has been objected to in German public debate, on the grounds that a Christian cross is not a neutral typographic mark. Some publishers and reference works now use a dash, an abbreviation or a different symbol instead.
A live dispute about current publishing practice, not a settled historical point. Editorial policies differ.
Placed before a date, the dagger also carries a general association with the dead that survives outside genealogy, as in a cast list where it marks an actor who has since died.
An upright stroke crossed by a shorter horizontal line near the top, set before a date and raised slightly above the baseline.
One marks the beginning of a life and the other its end.
The genealogical death mark uses the dagger glyph in a sense unrelated to footnoting.