The euro sign (€) is the currency sign used for the euro, the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro. The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996. It consists of a stylized letter E (or epsilon), crossed by two lines instead of one. In English, the sign immediately precedes the value (for instance, €10); in most other European languages, it follows the value, usually but not always with an intervening space (for instance, 10€, 10€).
There were originally 32 proposed designs for a symbol for Europe's new common currency; the Commission short-listed these to ten candidates. These ten were put to a public survey. After the survey had narrowed the original ten proposals down to two, it was up to the Commission to choose the final design. The other designs that were considered are not available for the public to view, nor is any information regarding the designers available for public query. The Commission considers the process of designing to have been internal and keeps these records secret. The eventual winner was a design created by a team of four experts whose identities have not been revealed. It is assumed that the Belgiangraphic designer Alain Billiet was the winner and thus the designer of the euro sign.[1]
The symbol € is based on the Greek letter epsilon (Є), with the first letter in the word “Europe” and with 2 parallel lines signifying stability.
The official story of the design history of the euro sign is disputed by Arthur Eisenmenger, a former chief graphic designer for the European Economic Community, who says he had the idea 25 years before the Commission's decision.[3]
The Commission specified a euro logo with exact proportions and colours (PMS Yellow foreground, PMS Reflex Blue background[4]), for use in public-relations material related to the euro introduction. While the Commission intended the logo to be a prescribed glyph shape, type designers made it clear that they intended instead to adapt the design to be consistent with the typefaces to which it was to be added.[5]
Use on computers and mobile phones
Generating the euro sign using a computer depends on the operating system and national conventions. Initially, some mobile phone companies issued an interim software update for their special SMS character set, replacing the less-frequent Japanese yen sign with the euro sign. Subsequent mobile phones have both currency signs.
The euro is represented in the Unicodecharacter set with the character name EURO SIGN and the code position U+20AC (decimal 8364) as well as in updated versions of the traditional Latin character set encodings.[a][b] In HTML, the € entity can also be used.
History of implementation
An implicit character encoding, along with the fact that the code position of the euro sign is different in historic encoding schemes (code pages), led to many initial problems displaying the euro sign consistently in computer applications, depending on access method. While displaying the euro sign was no problem as long as only one system was used (provided an up-to-date font with the proper glyph was available), mixed setups often produced errors. Initially, Apple, Microsoft and Unix systems each chose a different code point to represent a euro symbol: thus a user of one system might have seen a euro symbol whereas another would see a different symbol or nothing at all. Another was legacy software which could only handle older encodings such as pre-euro ISO 8859-1. In such situations character set conversions had to be made, often introducing conversion errors such as a question mark (?) being displayed instead of a euro sign. With widespread adoption of Unicode and UTF-8 encoding these issues rarely arise in modern computing.
⌥ Option+E in German, Italian, Spanish and Turkish layout
⇧ Shift+4 in Swedish layout
The Compose key sequence for the euro sign is Compose+= followed by e.
Typewriters
Classical typewriters are still used in many parts of the world, often recycled from businesses that have adopted desktop computers. Typewriters lacking the euro sign can imitate it by typing a capital "C", backspacing, and overstriking it with the equals sign.
Placement of the sign varies. Countries have generally continued the style used for their former currencies. In those countries where previous convention was to place the currency sign before the figure, the euro sign is placed in the same position (e.g., €3.50).[7] In those countries where the amount preceded the national currency sign, the euro sign is again placed in that relative position (e.g., 3,50 €).
The European Union’s InterinstitutionalStyle Guide (for EU staff) states that the euro sign should be placed in front of the amount without any space in English, but after the amount in most other languages.[8][9][10][11][12]
In English language newspapers and periodicals such as the Financial Times, The Economist and many more, the euro sign – like the dollar sign ($) and the pound sign (£) – is placed before the figure, unspaced,[13][14] When written out, "euro" is placed after the value in lower case; the plural is used for two or more units, and euro cents are separated with a point, not a comma (e.g., €1.50, 14 euros). This convention is the reverse of that used in many other European languages.
Prices of items costing less than one euro (for example ten cents) are often written using a local abbreviation like "ct." (particularly in Spain and Lithuania), "snt." (Finland), c. (Ireland) and Λ (the capital letter lambda for Λεπτό Leptó in Greece): (for example, 10 ct., 10c., 10Λ, 10 snt. The US style "¢" or "￠" is rarely seen in formal contexts. Alternatively, they can be written as decimals e.g. 0.07 €.
^For Eastern European character set Latin 10 with the euro sign, please see ISO/IEC 8859-16
^Alt+0128 is the correct alt code for the Euro under most system locale settings. Under Cyrillic-based system locale settings (using Windows code page1251), Alt+0136 must be used. Neither will work under Japanese (932), Korean (949) or Traditional Chinese (950) system locale settings. 0128 works because Microsoft has assigned 0x80 to the Euro sign in these code pages.
References
^ [The Belgian Alain Billet designed the euro sign]. Gazet van Antwerpen (in Dutch). 10 October 2001. Archived from the original on 1 April 2012. Retrieved 24 September 2011.
^"Amt für Veröffentlichungen – Interinstitutionelle Regeln für Veröffentlichungen – 7.3.3 Schreibregeln für Währungsbezeichnungen". publications.europa.eu.
^"Oficina de Publicaciones — Libro de estilo interinstitucional — 7.3.3. Normas de escritura de las referencias monetarias". publications.europa.eu.
^"Office des publications — Code de rédaction interinstitutionnel — 7.3.3. Règles d'écriture des références monétaires". publications.europa.eu.
^"Ufficio delle pubblicazioni — Manuale interistituzionale di convenzioni redazionali — 7.3.3. Regole di scrittura dei riferimenti monetari". publications.europa.eu.
^Walters, Jackie. "Currency units". Translation Directory. Retrieved 25 June 2008.
^. The Economist. Archived from the original on 13 April 2012. Retrieved 16 April 2012.
External links
Wikimedia Commons has media related to Euro sign.
Euro name and symbol, Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs of the European Commission
Communication from the Commission: The use of the Euro symbol, July 1997, Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs of the European Commission
Typing a Euro symbol on a non-European QWERTY keyboard. Several methods are shown for and others special characters.
December 26, 2022
euro, sign, euro, sign, currency, sign, used, euro, official, currency, eurozone, unilaterally, adopted, kosovo, montenegro, design, presented, public, european, commission, december, 1996, consists, stylized, letter, epsilon, crossed, lines, instead, english,. The euro sign is the currency sign used for the euro the official currency of the eurozone and unilaterally adopted by Kosovo and Montenegro The design was presented to the public by the European Commission on 12 December 1996 It consists of a stylized letter E or epsilon crossed by two lines instead of one In English the sign immediately precedes the value for instance 10 in most other European languages it follows the value usually but not always with an intervening space for instance 10 10 Euro signIn UnicodeU 20AC EURO SIGN amp euro CurrencyCurrencyEuroRelatedSee alsoU 20A0 EURO CURRENCY SIGN predecessor Category Contents 1 Design 2 Use on computers and mobile phones 2 1 History of implementation 2 2 Entry methods 3 Typewriters 4 Use 5 See also 6 Notes 7 References 8 External linksDesign Edit Graphic construction of the euro logo The euro sign in a selection of typefaces The euro sign logotype and handwritten There were originally 32 proposed designs for a symbol for Europe s new common currency the Commission short listed these to ten candidates These ten were put to a public survey After the survey had narrowed the original ten proposals down to two it was up to the Commission to choose the final design The other designs that were considered are not available for the public to view nor is any information regarding the designers available for public query The Commission considers the process of designing to have been internal and keeps these records secret The eventual winner was a design created by a team of four experts whose identities have not been revealed It is assumed that the Belgian graphic designer Alain Billiet was the winner and thus the designer of the euro sign 1 The symbol is based on the Greek letter epsilon Ye with the first letter in the word Europe and with 2 parallel lines signifying stability European Union 2 The official story of the design history of the euro sign is disputed by Arthur Eisenmenger a former chief graphic designer for the European Economic Community who says he had the idea 25 years before the Commission s decision 3 The Commission specified a euro logo with exact proportions and colours PMS Yellow foreground PMS Reflex Blue background 4 for use in public relations material related to the euro introduction While the Commission intended the logo to be a prescribed glyph shape type designers made it clear that they intended instead to adapt the design to be consistent with the typefaces to which it was to be added 5 Use on computers and mobile phones EditGenerating the euro sign using a computer depends on the operating system and national conventions Initially some mobile phone companies issued an interim software update for their special SMS character set replacing the less frequent Japanese yen sign with the euro sign Subsequent mobile phones have both currency signs The euro is represented in the Unicode character set with the character name EURO SIGN and the code position U 20AC decimal 8364 as well as in updated versions of the traditional Latin character set encodings a b In HTML the amp euro entity can also be used History of implementation Edit An implicit character encoding along with the fact that the code position of the euro sign is different in historic encoding schemes code pages led to many initial problems displaying the euro sign consistently in computer applications depending on access method While displaying the euro sign was no problem as long as only one system was used provided an up to date font with the proper glyph was available mixed setups often produced errors Initially Apple Microsoft and Unix systems each chose a different code point to represent a euro symbol thus a user of one system might have seen a euro symbol whereas another would see a different symbol or nothing at all Another was legacy software which could only handle older encodings such as pre euro ISO 8859 1 In such situations character set conversions had to be made often introducing conversion errors such as a question mark being displayed instead of a euro sign With widespread adoption of Unicode and UTF 8 encoding these issues rarely arise in modern computing Entry methods Edit Depending on keyboard layout and the operating system the symbol can be entered as AltGr 4 UK IRL AltGr 5 US INTL ESP DNK FIN ISL NOR SWE AltGr E BEL wbr ESP wbr FIN wbr FRA wbr GER wbr ITA wbr GRE wbr POR wbr CZE wbr EST wbr LTU wbr SVK wbr SWE wbr ROS wbr ROP wbr TUR AltGr U HU PL Ctrl Alt 4 UK IRL Ctrl Alt 5 US INTL ESP Ctrl Alt e in Microsoft Word in United States and more layouts Alt 0128 in Microsoft Windows depends on system locale setting c Ctrl Shift u followed by 20ac in ChromeOS most Linux distros and in other operating systems using IBus Ctrl k followed by e in the Vim text editorOn the macOS operating system a variety of key combinations are used depending on the keyboard layout for example Option 2 in British layout Option Shift 2 in United States layout Option Shift 5 in Slovenian layout Option in French layout 6 Option E in German Italian Spanish and Turkish layout Shift 4 in Swedish layoutThe Compose key sequence for the euro sign is Compose followed by e Typewriters EditClassical typewriters are still used in many parts of the world often recycled from businesses that have adopted desktop computers Typewriters lacking the euro sign can imitate it by typing a capital C backspacing and overstriking it with the equals sign Use EditSee also Language and the euro Euro sign appears in the top left corner of a 50 banknote A euro light sculpture at the European Central Bank in Frankfurt Placement of the sign varies Countries have generally continued the style used for their former currencies In those countries where previous convention was to place the currency sign before the figure the euro sign is placed in the same position e g 3 50 7 In those countries where the amount preceded the national currency sign the euro sign is again placed in that relative position e g 3 50 The European Union s Interinstitutional Style Guide for EU staff states that the euro sign should be placed in front of the amount without any space in English but after the amount in most other languages 8 9 10 11 12 In English language newspapers and periodicals such as the Financial Times The Economist and many more the euro sign like the dollar sign and the pound sign is placed before the figure unspaced 13 14 When written out euro is placed after the value in lower case the plural is used for two or more units and euro cents are separated with a point not a comma e g 1 50 14 euros This convention is the reverse of that used in many other European languages Prices of items costing less than one euro for example ten cents are often written using a local abbreviation like ct particularly in Spain and Lithuania snt Finland c Ireland and L the capital letter lambda for Lepto Lepto in Greece for example 10 ct 10c 10L 10 snt The US style or is rarely seen in formal contexts Alternatively they can be written as decimals e g 0 07 See also EditCurrency symbol List of currency symbols currently in useNotes Edit For details please see the Western Latin character sets computing For Eastern European character set Latin 10 with the euro sign please see ISO IEC 8859 16 Alt 0128 is the correct alt code for the Euro under most system locale settings Under Cyrillic based system locale settings using Windows code page 1251 Alt 0136 must be used Neither will work under Japanese 932 Korean 949 or Traditional Chinese 950 system locale settings 0128 works because Microsoft has assigned 0x80 to the Euro sign in these code pages References Edit Belg Alain Billiet ontwierp het euroteken The Belgian Alain Billet designed the euro sign Gazet van Antwerpen in Dutch 10 October 2001 Archived from the original on 1 April 2012 Retrieved 24 September 2011 Design Retrieved 16 May 2022 Connolly Kate 23 December 2001 Observer Inventor who coined euro sign fights for recognition The Observer London Archived from the original on 23 December 2007 Retrieved 21 August 2009 European Commission Economic and Financial Affairs How to use the euro name and symbol Ec europa eu Retrieved 7 April 2010 Typographers discuss the euro from December 1996 Mac OS How to type the Euro glyph Apple Technical Report TA26547 11 September 2003 Euro valutateken voor of achter het bedrag Nederlandse Taalunie Retrieved 21 December 2006 OP B 3 CRI Publications Office Publications Office Interinstitutional style guide 7 3 3 Rules for expressing monetary units publications europa eu Amt fur Veroffentlichungen Interinstitutionelle Regeln fur Veroffentlichungen 7 3 3 Schreibregeln fur Wahrungsbezeichnungen publications europa eu Oficina de Publicaciones Libro de estilo interinstitucional 7 3 3 Normas de escritura de las referencias monetarias publications europa eu Office des publications Code de redaction interinstitutionnel 7 3 3 Regles d ecriture des references monetaires publications europa eu Ufficio delle pubblicazioni Manuale interistituzionale di convenzioni redazionali 7 3 3 Regole di scrittura dei riferimenti monetari publications europa eu Walters Jackie Currency units Translation Directory Retrieved 25 June 2008 The Economist Style Guide Currencies The Economist Archived from the original on 13 April 2012 Retrieved 16 April 2012 External links Edit Wikimedia Commons has media related to Euro sign Euro name and symbol Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs of the European Commission Communication from the Commission The use of the Euro symbol July 1997 Directorate General for Economic and Financial Affairs of the European Commission Typing a Euro symbol on a non European QWERTY keyboard Several methods are shown for and others special characters Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Euro sign amp oldid 1128623357, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,
