For our American posters

[SteveD]

Why is "#" called a "pound sign"? Why is it used to mean "number"?

[Quizmonster]

I'm not American, but...it is possible to make an educated guess as to how the suffixed # meaning 'pounds weight' in the USA came, over time, to mean 'number'. The # was always in close association with a number, anyway, as in "carrots 16#" (16 lbs of carrots), so I can easily envisage a businessman shipping 16 crates - rather than carrots! - marking them '#1' to '#16' as an easy checking device for both himself and the person taking delivery. In other words, a symbol that was well known to traders was simply adapted to another use, originally by one person and then by all. This is, after all, exactly what happens to language/communication all the time. Think of how 'gay' now never means means bright, cheerful etc. Things change and that's all there is to it. Could that be the answer?

[SteveD]

Many moons ago when I used to work at Birmingham Accident Hospital, "#" used to mean "fracture" as in "# tib & fib" - fractured tibia and fibula. Maybe it is still used like this - I don't know, I'm out of touch now.

[Sylday]

I thought # was called the "hache sign", "hache" being French for the letter H, which the sign resembles. I can only think the French word is used to avoid confusion with the H sign itself - though it would be interesting to know just what the French call it.

[SteveD]

Here in Belgium, the French speakers call "#" "le petit carr�" (the little square).

[bernardo]

I've always known it as the hash sign, and I have never known it to be referred to as the pound sign.

[SteveD]

Just to confuse it even more, on my Belgian French AZERTY keyboard, the � sign is upper case � (last key on the right of the middle row). The # sign is Alt Gr + the 3 key. LOWER CASE: �&�"'(��!��)- azertyuiop^$ qsdfghjklm� WXCVBN?./+ Alt Gr: |@#^{} �[] �` \~tilde We also now have another question: Why "Hash"?

[Hippy]

This symbol was adopted by American telephone company, Bell in the early 1960s, after two researchers, Link Rice and Jack Soderberg, experimented with the development of a method of multiple frequency tone dialling. They soon discovered that by using the available tone combinations more than the required ten digits (0 to 9) could be sent and that to complete an aesthetically pleasing digital keyboard two extra keys could be included.

Following consultation with computer users nation wide, one key was quickly given the asterisk symbol, and after much discussion the second additional symbol was decided upon. The "#" symbol, similar to a musical notation sharp, was chosen.

A Bell Labs boffin, Don MacPherson, given the task of explaining this new key and its use, used the word "octothorpe" to describe this symbol in telephone useage. This was derived from the eight (octo) prongs and the surname of an Olympic medalist (Jim Thorpe).

Jim Thorpe was an outstanding American athlete who won medals in the Stockholm Olympics of 1912. He was stripped of his medals a year later and had return the gongs to Sweeden as he was a "professional" by virtue of his being paid 25 dollars a week during 1910 when playing for a minor baseball team. The prevailing Olympic rules said that only amateurs could compete and win medals.

Following a nagging campaign, in which Jim MacPherson was a part, the medals were restored in 1982, 29 years after the athlete's death.

"Octothorpe" has been used in techical circles since MacPherson coined it in the mid 1960s.

[Sir_Spikey]

to reply to Sylday, I don't believe that the french letter H has anything to do witht he name. using verticle and horizontal lines to shade or colour an area is known as cross-hatching and it has long been used to describre weaving in the same manner. 'hatch and thatch' being a modern term synonimous with describing buildings made back in the days of wattle and daub etc.