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"@". ASCII code 64. Common names: at sign, at, strudel. Rare: each, vortex, whorl, INTERCAL: whirlpool, cyclone, snail, ape, cat, rose, cabbage, amphora. ITU-T: commercial at.

The @ sign is used in an electronic mail address to separate the local part from the hostname. This dates back to July 1972 when Ray Tomlinson was designing the first[?] e-mail program.

It is ironic that @ has become a trendy mark of Internet awareness since it is a very old symbol, derived from the latin preposition "ad" (at).

Giorgio Stabile, a professor of history in Rome, has traced the symbol back to the Italian Renaissance in a Roman mercantile document signed by Francesco Lapi on 1536-05-04.

In Dutch it is called "apestaartje" (little ape-tail), in German "affenschwanz" (ape tail). The French name is "arobase". In Spain and Portugal it denotes a weight of about 25 pounds, the weight and the symbol are called "arroba". Italians call it "chiocciola" (snail).

See @-party.

Last updated: 2003-04-28

Nearby terms:

comment out ♦ commercial at ♦ Commercial Internet eXchange ♦ commercial off-the-shelf software

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