# On the phone why is it # called 'pound'? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [December 30, 2006, 8:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096 "2006-12-30T08:56:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 17\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 6:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/21 "2006-12-30T18:50:40Z")
We always called the # symbol ‘number sign’. ‘Pound sign’ even now makes me think of the £ symbol, even though we do not have that on our English-language keyboards (which tend to be US-standard by default). I am convinced that the ‘pound’ usage has crept in because of US-manufactured phone-answering systems that tell the listener to ‘press the pound key’: it’s a one-syllable word that matches ‘star’ for \* in brevity. I’ve never heard anyone local use ‘pound’ for # outside that context. Originally, I believe that the pound sterling was an actual troy pound of silver. Of course, this was hundreds of years ago, in the days when the major circulating coin of England was the silver penny (which was 1/240 pf a troy pound of silver). ---
**Author:** ![FRDE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e68b1a/32.png) [@FRDE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FRDE)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/22 "2006-12-30T19:07:19Z")
@Sunspace Your post made the silver penny drop in my brain The 'phone companies are using ‘pound’ to be politically correct ! ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 7:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/23 "2006-12-30T19:24:26Z")
[The Jargon File entry for ASCII](http://catb.org/jargon/html/A/ASCII.html), which lists all of the terms for non-alphanumeric characters current in computer slang. Some lists: > [@](#): > > # Common: number sign; pound; pound sign; hash; sharp; crunch; hex; [mesh]. Rare: grid; crosshatch; octothorpe; flash; \, pig-pen; tictactoe; scratchmark; thud; thump; splat. > [@](#): > > - Common: star; [splat]; \. Rare: wildcard; gear; dingle; mult; spider; aster; times; twinkle; glob (see glob ); Nathan Hale. (That last one is a particularly treacherous pun: Nathan Hale famously said “I regret I have only one life to give for my country.” ‘Life to give’ is ‘Ass to risk’, which is asterisk.) > [@](#): > > The pronunciation of # as ‘pound’ is common in the U.S. but a bad idea; Commonwealth Hackish has its own, rather more apposite use of ‘pound sign’ (confusingly, on British keyboards the £ happens to replace #; thus Britishers sometimes call # on a U.S.-ASCII keyboard ‘pound’, compounding the American error). The U.S. usage derives from an old-fashioned commercial practice of using a # suffix to tag pound weights on bills of lading. The character is usually pronounced ‘hash’ outside the U.S. There are more culture wars over the correct pronunciation of this character than any other, which has led to the ha ha only serious suggestion that it be pronounced “shibboleth” (see Judges 12:6 in an Old Testament or Tanakh). ---
**Author:** ![CC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f1d935/32.png) [@CC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CC)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/24 "2006-12-30T19:34:03Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] That’s the technical designation for that typographical character, in much the same sense that \* is properly an asterisk, though people are as apt to say “star” if not more so. [/QUOTE] I would _gladly_ listen to people call it a star if that meant I didn’t have to hear just about everyone call it an asterik. AAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!! ---
**Author:** ![AskNott](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asknott/32/5790_2.png) [@AskNott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AskNott)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 7:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/25 "2006-12-30T19:46:05Z")
In HS typing class (1967) we learned that #4 is number four, but 4# is four pounds. It depends on the position. Even then, it wasn’t used often for pounds. [QUOTE=CC] I would _gladly_ listen to people call it a star if that meant I didn’t have to hear just about everyone call it an asterik. AAAAAAARRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!! [/QUOTE] I regret that I have but one asterisk for my country. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![panamajack](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/47e85d/32.png) [@panamajack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panamajack)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/26 "2006-12-30T20:14:47Z")
Interestingly enough, “octothorpe” is a term invented by the phone company[sup]_[/sup] to refer to the symbol precisely because of the confusion over the symbol’s name. The etymology of the term is in dispute and may never be known - a good overview can be found [here](http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-oct1.htm). [sup]_[/sup]Bell Labs, part of the Bell Telephone company, which ultimately achieved monopoly status in the US, before being broken up, and whose descendants have now formed another near-monopoly. ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 8:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/27 "2006-12-30T20:38:56Z")
[QUOTE=panamajack] Interestingly enough, “octothorpe” is a term invented by the phone company[sup]_[/sup] to refer to the symbol precisely because of the confusion over the symbol’s name. The etymology of the term is in dispute and may never be known - a good overview can be found [here](http://www.worldwidewords.org/weirdwords/ww-oct1.htm). [sup]_[/sup]Bell Labs, part of the Bell Telephone company, which ultimately achieved monopoly status in the US, before being broken up, and whose descendants have now formed another near-monopoly. [/QUOTE] To my mind, that account puts the cart before the horse WRT to another part of the story. DTMF (touch tone) usage as originally conceived didn’t need the two extra keys. However, since the tones consisted of 1 of 4 low frequencies, plus 1 of 3 high frequencies, there were two leftover combinations. They realized that it would probably be useful to put them on the handset for future data entry applications. It was several years before they were commonly used for anything. Bell Labs undertook studies of characters used for various purposes to decide which characters should be displayed on them, and came up with \* and #. Actually, the original DTMF spec included 16 combinations with an extra high frequency used for the now-defunct Autovon system used by the US Military. There were 4 more keys on the pad, intended for 4 levels of priority override in making calls. As noted in the [wiki article](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dual-tone_multi-frequency), studies were also undertaken to arrive at the keypad layout: > [@](#): > > The Touch Tone system also introduced a standardized keypad layout. After testing 18 different layouts, they eventually chose the one familiar to us today, with 1 in the upper-left and 0 at the bottom. The adding-machine layout, with 1 in the lower-left was also tried, but at that time few people used adding machines, and having the 1 at the “start” (in European language reading order) led to fewer typing errors. In retrospect, many people consider that this was a mistake. With the widespread introduction of computers and bank machines, the phone keyboard has become “oddball”, causing mistakes. ---
**Author:** ![mnemosyne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c4cdca/32.png) [@mnemosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mnemosyne)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/28 "2006-12-30T21:44:47Z")
[QUOTE=Polycarp] This – “/” – by the way is a virgule. [/QUOTE] I assume that this has caused confusion too, seeing as to most francophones, the term “virgule” means “,” (a comma) and is used both in writing as we do in English, but also to denote the decimal point in numbers “2,657” meaning "2.657 ("two-point-six-five-seven) rather than two thousand six hundred and fifty seven. “/” to me is a slash, while "" is a backslash. In what domain is “/” called a virgule? ---
**Author:** ![Mk\_VII](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Mk\_VII](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mk_VII)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/29 "2006-12-30T21:55:49Z")
To me " / " is ‘stroke’ and I refuse to call it anything else ---
**Author:** ![yabob](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yabob/32/2821_2.png) [@yabob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yabob)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/30 "2006-12-30T22:04:21Z")
[QUOTE=mnemosyne] I assume that this has caused confusion too, seeing as to most francophones, the term “virgule” means “,” (a comma) and is used both in writing as we do in English, but also to denote the decimal point in numbers “2,657” meaning "2.657 ("two-point-six-five-seven) rather than two thousand six hundred and fifty seven. “/” to me is a slash, while "" is a backslash. In what domain is “/” called a virgule? [/QUOTE] Typesetting, which also distinguished the solidus as a separate character used in representing fractions. The reason for confusion with the comma: > [@](#): > > Rare, and ambiguous: {slash} or {comma}. “Virgule” (or rather, Latin “virgula”, meaning “little rod” or, vividly enough, “little penis”) was the name of a punctuation character shaped like a small {slash} and used in the Latin writing system much like a modern {comma} – hence the ambiguity of this term in modern English. Compare French “virgule” and Italian “virgola”, meaning “comma” (not “slash”); Italian “doppia virgola” and “virgoletta”, both meaning “{double quote}”. (1997-04-08) From [http://www.definethat.com/define/5320.htm](http://www.definethat.com/define/5320.htm) ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2006, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/31 "2006-12-30T23:50:06Z")
If ‘#’ is an octothorpe, is ‘+’ a quadrithorpe? Is ‘-’ a bithorpe? 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 12:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/32 "2006-12-31T00:29:18Z")
A hash mark in mathematics (sometimes called a tick mark) is a short line perpendicular to an axis in analytic geometry. Well that’s what I got. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 12:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/33 "2006-12-31T00:37:16Z")
[QUOTE=betenoir] A hash mark in mathematics (sometimes called a tick mark) is a short line perpendicular to an axis in analytic geometry. Well that’s what I got. [/QUOTE] Isn’t that a ‘hatch’ mark? There’s a similar usage in ‘cross-hatching’. Not the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Ignatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/3be4f8/32.png) [@Ignatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ignatz)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 1:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/34 "2006-12-31T01:07:57Z")
I had a phone-user protocol class years ago and I thought they called it an octo pleth, but I must have misheard that. But since we’ve hihjacked this to involve hash marks, see what I found. The first one shows the (white) ones I wore on my right arm for a while, long ago and far away. Other USA military branches have differient ones. The second one deals with hares and harriers. The last symbol in that is a “boob check mark”. The footnote also refers to a “dick check”, without a graphic (fortunately). Is this all for real, you harriers, especially the BOOB CHECK? That’s precious! [http://tpub.com/content/advancement/14325/css/14325\_278.htm](http://tpub.com/content/advancement/14325/css/14325_278.htm) [http://harrier.net/primer/marks.html](http://harrier.net/primer/marks.html) ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/35 "2006-12-31T01:19:31Z")
From following the Wikipedia trail I learned that the pound as an Old English unit of mass was originally defined as a given number of grains. Picture a sack containing 7,000 grains of barley. There you got one pound of barley. That’s what a pound originally was. There were various pound measures in history; the avoirdupois pound still in use has 7,000 grains. One historical oddity I read about was the “wool pound” used for weighing wool in medieval England. It has only 6,992 grains. How on earth did they decide that wool should be a pound minus the weight of 8 barleycorns? All I can guess is that measures were not universally standardized in the old days. There were variations from place to place. The avoirdupois pound from France must have had its standard weights maintained in Paris. The pound weights they used in England at the Wool Merchants Hall or whatever maybe had a few grains fall out of the sack on the way to London. ---
**Author:** ![betenoir](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/258eb7/32.png) [@betenoir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/betenoir)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 3:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/36 "2006-12-31T03:37:57Z")
[QUOTE=Sunspace] Isn’t that a ‘hatch’ mark? There’s a similar usage in ‘cross-hatching’. Not the same thing. [/QUOTE] I’'m getting hits for “hash mark”. Some of which the definanition also mentioned “hatch marks”, so may be related. ---
**Author:** ![Jodi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/7feea3/32.png) [@Jodi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jodi)\ **Post date:** [December 31, 2006, 4:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096/37 "2006-12-31T04:21:22Z")
[QUOTE=Mk VII] # was not a common sign in England before the advent of computers. I’ve always called it octothorpe [/QUOTE] I’ve never heard it called that in the States: “You’ve reached the voicemail of Jodi Lastname. Please leave a message. If you would like more personal assistance, please press octothorpe.” :dubious: 😛 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/on-the-phone-why-is-it-called-pound/386096.md?page=1)