Also known as medial s, descending s, langes s, long s, s, long ess
archaic form of the Latin letter S (ſ)
Key facts
- Writing system
- Latin
- Development
- s ſ
- Time period
- 700s to 1900s
via Wikipedia infobox
~23 min read
Encyclopedic overview
An italicized long s used in the word "Congress" (as "Congreſs") in the United States Bill of Rights
The long s, ⟨ſ⟩, also known as the medial s or initial s, is an archaic form of the lowercase letter ⟨s⟩, found mostly in works from the late 8th to early 19th centuries. It replaced one or both of the letter s in a double-s sequence (e.g., "ſinfulneſs" for "sinfulness" and "poſſeſs" or "poſseſs" for "possess", but never "poſſeſſ"). The modern ⟨s⟩ letterform is known as the "short", "terminal", or "round" s.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “ſ” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.