What is the universal symbol for money?
Red Cross Emblem Symbolizes Neutrality, Impartiality
Red Cross Emblem Symbolizes Neutrality, Impartiality
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June 04, 2020
The red cross emblem came into existence more than 150 years ago when the Geneva Conventions adopted it to protect medical personnel assisting the wounded on the battlefield. Soon after, the emblem was also adopted to identify the humanitarian services of Red Cross societies around the world.
Today, it is one of the most recognized symbols in the world for a very important reason.
During armed conflict, the red cross emblem means “don’t shoot,” that this person, vehicle, building or equipment is not part of the fight but is providing impartial assistance. The emblem provides protection for military medical units, transportation of the wounded, and for the Red Cross’s humanitarian aid. The global Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement—including the American Red Cross—utilizes the emblem to signify our promise of voluntary, neutral and impartial assistance to all people in need, regardless of race, religion or citizenship status.
Countries around the world protect the red cross emblem and limit its use to official Red Cross organizations and programs, as well as the medical services of their armed forces. In the United States, only the American Red Cross and the medical corps of the Armed Forces are permitted by law to use the red cross emblem. Some U.S. companies were granted an exception that were already using the emblem before 1906. Use of the red cross emblem by anyone else is not only prohibited, but also unlawful in the United States and around the world.
Respecting the emblem protects humanitarians
Every day, Red Cross personnel work in regions experiencing disaster, health emergency and armed conflict. Their ability to safely carry out a humanitarian mission and provide help depends on the recognition of the meaning of the red cross emblem. This is as important in the United States as it is around the world.
The red cross emblem must remain universally recognized and respected throughout the world as a trusted symbol of protection, neutrality and humanitarian aid in the face of armed conflict and disaster. Red Cross workers put themselves at risk to help those suffering from disasters like hurricanes, floods and earthquakes, famine, disease and armed conflict around the world. They carry no weapons. Their only shield is the red cross emblem.
The emblem is a symbol of protection that international law gives to the wounded and sick, and those caring for them, in armed conflict. They convey to those fighting that they must not attack anyone or anything that displays these emblems.
When the emblem is misused, it puts humanitarian workers and medical personnel at risk. These teams depend on community trust—both during peacetime and during war. The emblem’s symbolism protects humanitarians and gives them access to places that may otherwise be inaccessible.
The American Red Cross is proud to wear the red cross emblem to respond to more than 60,000 disasters around the United States every year and to deliver aid around the globe.
The red crescent and red crystal
Though the red cross is meant to be a symbol of neutrality, some countries feel that it has religious, political or cultural connotations. To resolve perception issues, the Geneva Conventions have been amended to include the red crescent, the red crystal, and the red lion with sun. The latter is no longer in use.
Today, there are 192 Red Cross and Red Crescent societies around the globe. Together with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC), they serve humanity in times of greatest need. Teams wear the emblems to signify that help is on the way.
Currency sign (typography)
This article is about the specific symbol for an unspecified currency. For currency signs and symbols in general, see Currency symbol.
Currency sign
History [ edit ]
Symbol ¤ on a keyboard
The symbol was first encoded for computers in 1972, as a placeholder for national currency symbols such as the dollar sign, in national variants (ISO 646) of ASCII and the International Reference Variant. [2] It was proposed by Italy [3] as an alternative (to the dollar sign) at 0x24. In reality, most national standards retained the dollar sign as too important. [1] : 6 ASCII and ISO 646 were specified as 7-bit encoding, which allowed for 96 printable characters and 32 control codes. The character is used in the GSM default 7-bit encoding as specified in 3GPP TS 23.038 / GSM 03.38 at 0x24. The introduction of 8-bit encoding and the ISO/IEC 8859 code pages meant that all major national currency symbols (in use at the time) could be accommodated. When ISO 8859 was standardized, this symbol was placed at code point 0xA4 in the Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew character sets. The Cyrillic set included it in early drafts, but it was removed in the published version in favour of including the section sign, § , [a] and it was not included in all later added Latin sets. In Soviet computer systems (usually using some variant of KOI character set) this symbol was placed at the code point used by the dollar sign in ASCII. ISO Latin 9 reallocated the code point used for this symbol to the euro sign, € , but this standard failed to gain significant acceptance given the dominance at the time of Microsoft’s Windows-1252 code page. In the modern era, the Unicode standard gives each of the major currency symbols – and this one – its own unique and device-independent code point, with implementation (or not) left to font designers.
Other uses [ edit ]
The symbol is used as a non-printing «end of cell» marker for tables in Microsoft Word. [6]
Unicode [ edit ]
Keyboard entry [ edit ]
- in Windows using Alt + 0
- 1 6 4
- In Linux as
- Compose o x
- in Linux and ChromeOS using
- Ctrl + ⇧ Shift + u
- A 4 space
- using textcurrency in LaTeX.
OS-specific [ edit ]
The currency sign was once a part of the Mac OS Roman character set, but Apple changed the symbol at that code point to the euro sign in Mac OS 8.5. In pre-Unicode Windows character sets (Windows-1252), the generic currency sign was retained at 0xA4 and the euro sign was introduced as a new code point, at 0x80 in the little used (by Microsoft) control-code space 0x80 to 0x9F.
See also [ edit ]
- XXX (currency) (ISO 4217 code for no specific currency)
Explanatory footnotes [ edit ]
- ^ ISO-9959-5 was adopted from ECMA-113, beginning with ECMA-113’s 1988 edition, although a superseded draft of ISO-8859-5 (DIS-8859-5:1987) did exist following the 1986 edition of ECMA-113. Although the 1988 edition [4] and the 1986 edition [5] (KOI8-E) of ECMA-113 have very different layouts, their repertoires are very similar, differing only in that the 1986 edition has a universal currency sign and the 1988 edition has a section sign.
References [ edit ]
- ^ abBemer, Robert William (1980). «Chapter 1: Inside ASCII». General Purpose Software (PDF) . Best of Interface Age. Vol. 2. Portland, OR, USA: dilithium Press. pp. 1–50. ISBN0-918398-37-1 . LCCN79-67462. Archived from the original on 2016-08-27 . Retrieved 2016-08-27 , from:
- Bemer, Robert William (May 1978). «Inside ASCII — Part I». Interface Age. Portland, OR, USA: dilithium Press. 3 (5): 96–102. ,
- Bemer, Robert William (June 1978). «Inside ASCII — Part II». Interface Age. Portland, OR, USA: dilithium Press. 3 (6): 64–74. ,
- Bemer, Robert William (July 1978). «Inside ASCII — Part III». Interface Age. Portland, OR, USA: dilithium Press. 3 (7): 80–87.
- ^
- «ISO 646 (Good old ASCII)». czyborra.com . Retrieved 2016-04-13 .
- ^
- «Character histories — notes on some Ascii code positions». jkorpela.fi.
- ^
- Standard ECMA-113 — 8-Bit Single-Byte Coded Graphic Character Sets — Latin/Cyrillic Alphabet (PDF) (2 ed.). European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA). 1988-06-30.
- ^
- Standard ECMA-113 — 8-Bit Single-Byte Coded Graphic Character Sets — Latin/Cyrillic Alphabet (PDF) (1 ed.). European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA). 1986-06-26.
- ^
- Suzanne S. Barnhill. «Word’s non-printing formatting marks: cell markers». ssbarnhill.com.
- ^
- «IBM Globalization – Keyboard layouts». ibm.com. 2013-11-11. Archived from the original on July 3, 2018 . Retrieved 2016-04-13 .
Currency symbols in Unicode and a keyboard layout for them
The following table shows basic information about currency symbols in Unicode. The “Key” column indicates how the symbol can be typed when using a special currency keyboard layout (for Windows; works on any QWERTY keyboard). The notation AltGr indicates that the Alt key to the right of the space bar (often with the engraving AltGr) is used to modify the effect of a letter key.
| Code | Name | Browser | Image | Key | Usage (Quotations are from the Unicode Standard) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| U+0024 | DOLLAR SIGN | $ | view | Shift S | Used for several currencies, not only for the US dollar. |
| U+00A2 | CENT SIGN | ¢ | view | C | Used for hundredth of a US dollar. |
| U+00A3 | POUND SIGN | £ | view | AltGr L | Used for British pound. |
| U+00A4 | CURRENCY SIGN | ¤ | view | X | Used as a generic placeholder for a currency. |
| U+00A5 | YEN SIGN | ¥ | view | Y | Use for Japanese yen and Chinese yuan. |
| U+058F | ARMENIAN DRAM SIGN | ֏ | view | Shift D | |
| U+060B | AFGHANI SIGN | ؋ | view | A | |
| U+09F2 | BENGALI RUPEE MARK | ৲ | view | AltGr B | Historical. |
| U+09F3 | BENGALI RUPEE SIGN | ৳ | view | Shift B | Used in Bangladesh. |
| U+09FB | BENGALI GANDA MARK | ৻ | view | Shift G | |
| U+0AF1 | GUJARATI RUPEE SIGN | ૱ | view | AltGr G | |
| U+0BF9 | TAMIL RUPEE SIGN | ௹ | view | AltGr Shift T | |
| U+0E3F | THAI CURRENCY SYMBOL BAHT | ฿ | view | B | |
| U+17DB | KHMER CURRENCY SYMBOL RIEL | ៛ | view | AltGr K | Used in Cambodia. |
| U+20A0 | EURO-CURRENCY SIGN | ₠ | view | AltGr E | Was intended for ECU (European Currency Unit). |
| U+20A1 | COLON SIGN | ₡ | view | AltGr C | Used in Costa Rica and El Salvador. |
| U+20A2 | CRUZEIRO SIGN | ₢ | view | Shift C | Used in Brazil. |
| U+20A3 | FRENCH FRANC SIGN | ₣ | view | F | Historical. |
| U+20A4 | LIRA SIGN | ₤ | view | AltGr Shift L | Was intended for lira. |
| U+20A5 | MILL SIGN | ₥ | view | M | Rarely used for 1/1000 of US dollar. |
| U+20A6 | NAIRA SIGN | ₦ | view | N | Used in Nigeria. |
| U+20A7 | PESETA SIGN | ₧ | view | AltGr P | Historical. |
| U+20A8 | RUPEE SIGN | ₨ | view | Shift R | “India, unofficial legacy practice.” |
| U+20A9 | WON SIGN | ₩ | view | W | Used in Korea. |
| U+20AA | NEW SHEQEL SIGN | ₪ | view | S | Used in Israel. |
| U+20AB | DONG SIGN | ₫ | view | D | Used in Vietnam. |
| U+20AC | EURO SIGN | € | view | E | Widely used in Europe. |
| U+20AD | KIP SIGN | ₭ | view | K | Used in Laos. |
| U+20AE | TUGRIK SIGN | ₮ | view | T | Used in Mongolia. |
| U+20AF | DRACHMA SIGN | ₯ | view | AltGr Shift D | Historical. |
| U+20B0 | GERMAN PENNY SIGN | ₰ | view | AltGr Shift P | Historical. |
| U+20B1 | PESO SIGN | ₱ | view | P | Used in the Philippines. |
| U+20B2 | GUARANI SIGN | ₲ | view | G | Used in Paraguay. |
| U+20B3 | AUSTRAL SIGN | ₳ | view | AltGr A | Historical. |
| U+20B4 | HRYVNIA SIGN | ₴ | view | Z | Used in Ukraine. |
| U+20B5 | CEDI SIGN | ₵ | view | AltGr Shift C | Used in Ghana. |
| U+20B6 | LIVRE TOURNOIS SIGN | ₶ | view | Shift L | Historical. |
| U+20B7 | SPESMILO SIGN | ₷ | view | AltGr Shift S | “Historical international currency associated with Esperanto.” |
| U+20B8 | TENGE SIGN | ₸ | view | Shift T | Used in Kazakhstan. |
| U+20B9 | INDIAN RUPEE SIGN | ₹ | view | I | Official rupee currency sign for India. |
| U+20BA | TURKISH LIRA SIGN | ₺ | view | L | Official lira currency sign for Turkey. |
| U+20BB | NORDIC MARK SIGN | ₻ | Shift M | Historical, early representation of the Mark currency used in Denmark and Norway. | |
| U+20BC | MANAT SIGN | ₼ | AltGr M | Azerbaijani currency. | |
| U+20BD | RUBLE SIGN |  | view | R | The Central Bank of Russia has announced that this sign is official. |
| U+5143 | CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-5143 (yuán) | 元 | view | Shift W | |
| U+5713 | CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-5713 (yuán) | 圓 | view | AltGr W | Used in Chinese for various currencies. |
| U+A838 | NORTH INDIC RUPEE MARK | ꠸ | view | Shift N | Historical. |
| U+FDFC | RIAL SIGN | ﷼ | view | AltGr R | Used in Iran. |
| U+FE69 | SMALL DOLLAR SIGN | ﹩ | view | AltGr S | Small form variant of $. |
| U+FF04 | FULLWIDTH DOLLAR SIGN | ＄ | view | Q S | Fullwidth version of $. |
| U+FFE0 | FULLWIDTH CENT SIGN | ￠ | view | Q C | Fullwidth version of ¢. |
| U+FFE1 | FULLWIDTH POUND SIGN | ￡ | view | Q L | Fullwidth version of £. |
| U+FFE5 | FULLWIDTH YEN SIGN | ￥ | view | Q Y | Fullwidth version of ¥. |
| U+FFE6 | FULLWIDTH WON SIGN | ￦ | view | Q W | Fullwidth version of ₩. |
The table contains Unicode Characters in the “Symbol, Currency” category. It is larger than the Unicode block Currency Symbols, which is just an area dedicated for currency symbols. For historical and other reasons, currency symbols appear in other blocks, too.
In addition, the characters 元 U+5143 CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-5143 (yuán) and ᙑ U+5713 CJK UNIFIED IDEOGRAPH-5713 (yuán) are included for their meaning as currency symbols, even though they are not in the “Symbol, Currency” category.
The new character for the Russian ruble has been included into the PT Sans font, available also as hosted by Google. It has been added to several fonts (Arial, Calibri, Microsoft Sans Serif, Segoe UI, Tahoma, Times New Roman) in a software update to Windows.
Some other characters are sometimes called currency symbols, despite being letters that just have a currency denotation as one of their uses. For example, a symbol called “Kannada rupee mark” (ರ, U+0CBO), is Kannada letter ra, which may be used as an abbreviation of rupee.
Information about the use of currency symbols in different languages and countries can be found on the CLDR page By-Type Chart: Numbers: Currencies (entries with names ending with or
The keyboard layout
The “currency keyboard layout” is a demonstration of a concept: a method of allowing simple and relatively natural way of entering special characters when they can be mentally associated with letter keys. Here the association is primarily based on the shape of the symbol, secondarily (especially when the symbol does not resemble any Latin letter) on the name or meaning of the symbol.
The layout may be freely used, distributed, and modified. It was created using Microsoft Keyboard Layout Creator (MSKLC) and can easily be edited with it. The layout is also available as a .klc file.
The layout is useful if you need to type different currency symbols. For a more common case, typing just one currency symbol, it is usually more convenient to use a keyboard layout suitable for the language(s) being written and just enhance it with a key combination for the symbol (say, AltGr Y for the yen sign, or AltGr L for the Turkish lira).
First published 2013-12-21 . Updated 2014-08-15 to cover the ruble sign as defined in Unicode version 7. Some corrections to the description and the installable files made 2014-08-24 thanks to kind help from Doug Ewell. Fixed links 2019-01-22.
This page belongs to section Characters and encodings of the free information site IT and communication by Jukka “Yucca” Korpela .
