Caron

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A diacritical mark shaped like a small v or inverted circumflex placed over certain letters to indicate a change in pronunciation or stress ; a symbol used in some alphabets to denote specific phonetic values ; a typographic sign that alters the sound of a letter in various languages
2. A small wedge-shaped diacritic placed above letters to modify their sound, commonly seen in some Slavic and Baltic languages ; a mark that signals a palatalized or softened pronunciation of a character ; a graphical element used in writing systems to distinguish phonemes by adding a visual cue atop letters
3. A distinct typographic accent resembling a caret or inverted hat placed over letters to indicate altered pronunciation ; a linguistic diacritic that changes pronunciation in different languages and alphabets ; a specialized glyph used in orthography to highlight consonant or vowel modifications for phonological clarity

Etymology: The caron is a small "v"-shaped mark that sits above letters such as Czech "č" or "š", and its name is one of the more uncertain stories in English typography. The earliest recorded use in English dates to the United States Government Printing Office Style Manual of 1967, where the term apparently referred to an inverted caret, the "^" mark used in proofreading. The mark itself is far older than its name: diacritics of this shape were used in Czech and other Central European orthographies long before anyone in English needed a word for them. The most likely explanation is that the name grew out of "caret" because of the shape resemblance, with the ending "-on" possibly borrowed from "macron", the name of the straight bar over a vowel. Another possibility is that the "-on" reflects an augmentative ending, reanalysed from the "-et" of "caret" as if it were a diminutive. Neither explanation has been confirmed, so the name remains a plausible guess rather than a documented coinage.

Synonyms: háček, wedge, check mark, accent mark, diacritic