What ͙ means
It marks a textual change, not emphasis. A 2003 encoding proposal described it for fragmentary Greek papyri, distinguishing ancient changes from modern editorial ones.
Later editorial use also covered deliberate changes to a proposed reading or an ancient exemplar (an older source copy). A 2016 discussion connects the subliteral asterisk to Reinhold Merkelbach’s convention for Herculaneum papyri. The asteriskos is a separate sign placed in manuscript margins.
Don't confuse it with
1Questions people ask
1Why does the mark float by itself?
It needs a base letter. A dotted circle may stand in for it; unsupported fonts can position the mark poorly.
How to type ͙
Windows (Word)
Alt+XType 0359, then Alt+X to get ͙.
Windows
Win+Rrun charmap for the full table, or use the emoji picker's Ω symbols tab (Win + .).
macOS
Control+Command+SpaceOpen the character viewer and search “combining asterisk below”.
Linux
Ctrl+Shift+UType 0359, then Enter or Space.
HTML
͙CSS
\0359Codes and encoding1 code points
HTML decimal
͙
HTML hex
͙
CSS content
content: "\0359";
Each escape is closed by the next backslash; a trailing space is needed before a literal hex digit.
URL encoded
%CD%99
1
On screen
1
Code points
1
JS .length
2
UTF-8 bytes
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.