What ᪲ means
It marks a slight nasal quality in a transcribed sound. In Teuthonista, a specialist system for writing dialect speech, the mark modifies a letter to show weak nasalization. By itself, it is not a mathematical infinity symbol.
Teuthonista records dialect speech in fine sound detail. It builds on ordinary letters with marks so transcribers can distinguish pronunciations that everyday spelling groups together.
The wider European transcription lineage includes Lepsius's 1855 general linguistic alphabet, a system for recording speech sounds. Hotzenköcherle's 1962 Swiss German transcription material shows this exact infinity-shaped mark. Other traditions made different choices: Rousselot–Gilliéron records an infinity-like form for weak nasalization, while NALR uses a different combining mark for the same value. Their signs are not interchangeable; the transcription system's key decides.
How do I type ᪲ correctly?
Put it after the letter it modifies. For example, write a᪲, with the mark following its base character.
A dotted circle in a character chart stands in for a missing base; it is not part of ᪲. Font support and mark placement determine whether it attaches cleanly in text.
A specialist dialect-transcription mark; its infinity-like shape does not make it casual mathematical shorthand.
For mathematical infinity, use ∞.
Don't confuse it with
1Questions people ask
2Why does ᪲ show a dotted circle or float?
A dotted circle in a character chart stands in for the missing base letter. By itself, ᪲ can look detached; font support and mark placement determine how it attaches to real text.
Does ᪲ mean the same thing in every dialect-transcription system?
No. Related systems can use different marks or assign values differently; read ᪲ using the key for the system that produced it.
How to type ᪲
᪲\1AB2Codes and encoding1 code points
A visible symbol can contain several code points. JS .length counts UTF-16 units; UTF-8 counts bytes.