Manichaean Punctuation Star

It marks the beginning and end of a headline. In a transcription—a readable text version of a manuscript—the Manichaean headline mark appears as a pair. The two positions frame the heading as one unit; its star shape alone does not show you that role.

Other Manichaean punctuation signs can divide prose and verse, highlight important concepts, or mark language boundaries. Those are jobs of the broader system, not extra meanings to assign to this star.

How did the Manichaean punctuation system spread?

The Manichaean script developed in the third century in Mesopotamia. It is connected to Syriac Estrangelo, a style of Syriac writing, and was probably influenced by Palmyrene forms. The script is part of the Manichaean religious and manuscript tradition; this star marks headlines within it.

In the 8th century, Uyghur adoption of Manichaeism brought translations from Middle Iranian languages into Old Uyghur, an earlier Turkic written language. The script and its punctuation entered Old Uyghur manuscripts too. Manichaean punctuation in Old Uyghur served overlapping structural functions with punctuation in Iranian texts, though page conventions varied.

Other members of the system include a paired two-dot sign used with headlines or captions, and a dot-within-dot sign that divides text units. These siblings show how punctuation functions could overlap across Iranian and Old Uyghur manuscripts without making the signs interchangeable.