A question mark
? seems to be composed of two distinct pieces, top and bottom. Do these pieces have their own names, and if so, what are they?
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If you're willing to go entirely by hearsay, a question mark has a curl, a lobe and a ball.
It's hearsay because I couldn't find a picture of Ed Benguiat's sketch, but if the linked blog is quoting reliably, then I would say this is a fair answer since Ed Benguiat is unquestionably an important expert in typeface design.
I couldn't find any common typographical terminology for the top part so you could call the top bit:
You could call the bottom bit:
A tittle is a small distinguishing mark, such as diacritic or the dot in the letter i and j, so I propose the terms squiggle and tittle.
In The elements of typographic style by Robert Bringhurst, they are referred to as a hook / crook and a dot.
protected by tchrist Jul 6 '14 at 23:57
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