At Sign - History

History

There are several theories about the origin of the commercial at character.

• An Italian academic claims to have traced the @ symbol to the 16th century, in a mercantile document sent by Francesco Lapi from Seville to Rome on May 4, 1536. The document is about commerce with Pizarro, in particular the price of an @ of wine in Peru. The @ symbol has long been used in Spanish and Portuguese as an abbreviation of arroba, a unit of weight equivalent to 25 pounds, and derived from the Arabic expression of "a quarter" (الربع pronounced ar-rubʿ). In Italian, the symbol was interpreted to mean amphora (anfora). Currently, the word arroba means both the at-symbol and a unit of weight. In Italian, the symbol represents one amphora, a unit of weight and volume based upon the capacity of the standard amphora jar, and entered modern meaning and use as "at the rate of" or "at price of" in northern Europe.
• The symbol developed as a mercantile shorthand symbol of "each at"—the symbol resembling a small "a" inside a small "e"—to distinguish it from the different "at" (symbolized by the mere letter "a") or "per." For example, the cost of "12 apples @ $1" would be $12, whereas the cost of "12 apples at $1" would be $1—a crucial and necessary distinction.
• Medieval monks abbreviated the Latin word ad (at, toward, by, about) next to a numeral. One reason for this abbreviation was that it saved space and ink. Since thousands of pages of Bible documents were copied onto expensive papyrus or hides, and the words at, toward, by and about repeated millions of times throughout the ages, a considerable amount of resources could be spared this way. A theory concerning this graphic puts forward the idea that the form derives from the Latin word ad, where the d is spelled in capital, and then inversed back over the alpha in front of it, thus forming a shape that resembles the @.
• It was originally an abbreviation of the Greek preposition ανά (transliterated ana), meaning at the rate of or per.
• From Norman French "à" meaning "at" in the "each" sense, i.e. "2 widgets à £5.50 = £11.00", comes the accountancy shorthand notation in English commercial vouchers and ledgers to the 1990s, when the email usage superseded the accountancy usage. It is also used like this in Modern French and Swedish; in this view, the at-symbol is a stylised form of à that avoids raising the writing hand from the page in drawing the symbol; this compromise between @ and à in French handwriting is found in street market signs.