the alphabet

[ros56]

can anyone tell me what the dot above the letter i is called

[wilmay]

tittle

[THECORBYLOON]

It's called a tittle.

[sara3]

wow, you people know EVERYTHING!

[Clanad]

Although several sources support the previous responses, several others of usually a scholarly bent are insistent that: "...The dot is just called Superscript Dot.. It was added to the letter i in the Middle Ages to distinguish the letter (in manuscripts) from adjacent vertical strokes in such letters as u, m and n. J is a variant form of i which emerged at this time and subsequently became a separate letter..." This particular source (one of many) is English for Students... Take your pick, it seems...

[Quizmonster]

The dot above an �i or �j' and the cross on a �t' may be called either a �jot' or a �tittle'.
A jot - from the Greek letter �iota' = �i' - means the least part of any writing. It can be applied to dots, strokes, Spanish tildes etc. A tittle is defined as a small stroke or point in writing. The two words are, effectively, synonyms, even though they are usually now combined in the phrase "not a jot or tittle".
There is a tendency to suppose that the jot is somehow tied to the dot, because a dot is what the letter �i' has and they share the �i' sound via the original word �iota'. By the same token, the tittle is often supposed to relate to the stroke on the �t', presumably because they share a �t' sound. However, either can be used for the i/j-dot or the t-stroke, really, or any other such mark.

[BillySugger]

A dot

[brionon]

BillySugger
Sun 12/10/08
19:43 A dot

Thank Thor -someone with a bit of sense. A DOT !! It's English.

[Quizmonster]

Actually, the word dot was not applied to the mark we are discussing here until the middle of the 18th century. Before that, in English, a dot was no more than the head of a boil, a lump or a speck of colour!
Both jot and tittle - equally English - have been used to mean precisely the same thing since the early 16th century...ie they've been around and part of our language for a heck of a lot longer than dot has!
But even if they hadn't, what's wrong with having a variety of ways of expressing our ideas? Its richness is one of English's major glories...let's leave it that way rather than try to narrow it down, eh?