Every Internet user has probably come across the "dog" icon, because it is associated with e-mail. It is also now perceived as the closest association with the entire global Internet. They tried to give this symbol a simpler name, for example: "ear", "frog" and so on, in the 90s they even called it "bun", but, unfortunately, they failed to gain a foothold. In Russian, he is given the unspoken name of our four-legged friend, since he looks like this animal curled up. Here is one of the answers to the question why the icon was called "dog". In other countries, this symbol is also associated with various objects or animals, which is discussed further.

Dog icon in other countries

What is this icon called in other languages? Each nation has its own mentality and associations, so the names of the same "dog" icon vary greatly. Did you know that in the Netherlands this sign is called "monkey's tail", in Israel - "strudel", and in Italy even "snail". In the countries of the Scandinavian Peninsula (Norway, Sweden and Denmark), the "dog" familiar to us is called "elephant trunk" or "pig's tail", but there is also a spare name - "twisted harp". In Hungary, it is unflatteringly called a "worm" or a "tick". The Greeks call it "duck", America and Finland routinely say "cat", and in China and Taiwan, in contrast to the post-Soviet space, it is called "mouse", and in Turkey it is even "rose". The Japanese identify with the forces of nature and talk about this sign "whirlpool", the Kazakhs - "lunar echo". In the Czech Republic and Slovakia, it is customary to call the sign "rollmops" (a roll of herring under a marinade).

Esperanto language and postal symbol

Esperanto is an artificially created language that unites the whole world. It was invented by the Polish ophthalmologist Ludwik Zamenhof in 1887. The plans of its creator were to introduce this language for international communication, to make it the second after the native one for every inhabitant of the globe. So, in Esperanto, this icon is called heliko - "snail".

In 2004, the International Telecommunication Union introduced the code for this symbol @ ( - - - ) in Morse code to make it easier to use e-mail. Such a code contains the Latin characters A and C, graphically displayed together. Incidentally, this was the only major change that had been made to Morse code since World War II.

Origin and nature of the sign

It is still unknown exactly where this symbol came from. The roots of his "pedigree" are lost in hoary antiquity, but still scientists insist that he appeared at least in the 15th century, and maybe even earlier. All linguists and paleographers are at a loss and cannot establish one true version of the origin of this simple, uncomplicated icon. Here are some popular suggestions:

• The following version is very common in the world. The @ sign is said to have been invented by medieval monks. The first such letter "a" with a long twisted tail was used by the Byzantine chronicler Constantine Manasseh in 1345 instead of the letter "a" in the word "Amen". But for what it was done, scientists have not figured out.
• Also, many are sure that this badge was borrowed from merchants, since they had their own billing system, which looked like this: "1 meter of silk @" (a fictional example) - this meant that 1 meter of silk was sold for $ 5. The advantage of such a record was its versatility, so any transactions could be made without deep knowledge of the language and unnecessary words.
• Professor Giorgio Stabile found reference in a 16th century document to "one A wine", possibly an amphora. Most likely, the letter A, according to the traditions of that time, was decorated with a curl and looked like something similar to our @ sign. This document dates from 1536.

• The sign "dog" in English denotes the preposition at (on).
• Also, the American Berthold Ullman argued that this sign was invented by monks in the Middle Ages in order to shorten the Latin preposition ad, a kind of universal word that took on the meaning of any preposition or allied word (on, in, oh, about, to, by, in relation, because , also, and so on). Such an easy trick helped save ink and paper - luxury items that were very difficult to obtain in those days.
• The French, Spaniards and Portuguese used such a sign on the letter to designate "arroba" - a measure of weight, which is numerically approximately equal to 15 kilograms.
• A similar sign in the 16-17th centuries was found even in Russian books. Specifically, on the title page of the Sudebnik of Ivan the Terrible, which was published in 1550. It was a scroll-adorned capital letter "az" of the Cyrillic writing system, which denoted the first point.

Additional versions

There is also an interesting coincidence. In the 16th century, messengers who were in charge of delivering mail used a post horn. Previously, butchers used them to mark their arrival in some area to buy animals, but already in 1712 the horn was assigned only to postmen and was forbidden to be used by other persons. In Germany, horse mail was also equipped with horns. Even now you can see such horns on various emblems and logos that are somehow connected with the mail. This horn and the @ sign are a bit similar.

Keyboard icon

The "dog" icon smoothly migrated from typewriters, as it was actively used in trade and related calculations, denoting various prepositions. The first model of the American typewriter brand "Underwood" was already equipped with a key with the @ sign in 1885.

Internet and dog

Internet users should thank programmer Tomlinson - the creator of e-mail. But what does the "dog" icon mean on the World Wide Web? We needed a character that would not be found in any given name and surname, in order to avoid confusion in separating the username and email server, so that there would be no obstacles in the identification process. The choice fell on the already well-known @ icon. Thus, the first email on the Arpanet network was called [email protected] and the "dog" icon on the keyboard has become one of the most requested symbols.

What is such a symbol for?

But why should any email address contain the @ sign? Is it a necessity or just another fashion trend?

The first option is correct. Let's see why.

The mail server in the login is the domain name. It is better to illustrate this with an example. Have an email address [email protected](absolutely random and fictitious login). In this case, humanpower is the username and arpa.com is the domain name, the @ symbol stands for the English preposition "at" and indicates the location of the login, i.e. humanpower on arpa.com.

What happened before Tomlinson?

Before Ray Tomlinson, this icon was used only in creating programs in PHP (the "dog" is used to disable the output of errors, as well as warnings that may appear during program execution), Java (used to declare an annotation), Perl (to define an array ) and Transact-SQL. If it were not for the creator of the mail, then this icon would not be used so actively among ordinary Internet users.

In general, after the creation of the ARPANET network, it did not gather many fans, they did not trust it and did not want to use it. But in 1977 there was a huge breakthrough in the history of the development of the World Wide Web - this network made it possible to send various letters around the world. It was thanks to Tomlinson that the long and slow sending of mail letters around the world was extremely simplified. Any files, documents and images have become very easy to receive and send in seconds.

Why "dog"?

There are many funny versions of why the icon is called "dog". In addition to the main version mentioned at the beginning of the article, the preposition at sounds like a dog barking.

But they agree that this happened because of one of the first computer games "Adventure" ("Adventure"). It was a popular game of the eighties. And the essence of the game was to overcome the labyrinth and reach the depths where the treasures were hidden. There were no graphics familiar to our eyes, since all displays of that time were text. Even simple signs (!, +, -, etc.) were used to indicate obstacles. The game had a main character and a dog - his assistant, which could be used for reconnaissance of the territory. Just it was indicated by the @ sign. But no one will tell you if the sign was named after a character or a character after a sign.

It will no longer be known exactly where this name came from, but nevertheless, this icon on the computer has firmly entered our lives.

How to type the "dog" icon on the keyboard

Everyone knows that the @ symbol on the keyboard is located on the number 2 in the top row of numbers. But you can't just get it. You need to switch the keyboard layout from Russian to English. After holding down the Shift button and simultaneously pressing the number 2. And you're done, send your letter!

Unlike complex operations with the "dogs" icon on a computer, on phones and various handheld gadgets, this icon is available on the symbol keyboard and next to numbers and punctuation marks.

After talking about how to type the "dog" icon on the keyboard, you would probably be interested to know that it is used not only for the name of the mailbox. Namely:

At first, a cursory and uninterested glance, the discussion of some simple icon seems ridiculous and pointless, but just such topics should be of most interest. Indeed, behind something ordinary there is a huge painstaking work or a long mysterious intricate story, as in our case. That's how many amusing details hid in itself a small mail icon @. We hope that our article has broadened your horizons and you have learned something new.

On the web, it is used as a separator between username and hostname in email address syntax.

Some figures in the Internet space call this symbol "one of the main pop symbols of our time, a sign of our common communication space." Somewhat grandiloquently, in my opinion, but the following fact testifies to the worldwide recognition of this symbol, and as it is even sometimes noted, “canonization”. In February 2004, the International Telecommunication Union introduced a code for the @ symbol (. - - . - .) in Morse code to facilitate the transmission of email addresses. The code combines the Latin letters A and C and reflects their joint graphic writing.

The search for the origins of the @ symbol takes us back at least to the 15th century, and perhaps even further, although linguists and paleographers still disagree on this issue.
Professor Giorgio Stabile put forward such a hypothesis. A 16th-century document written by a Florentine merchant mentioned "the price of one A of wine" (possibly an amphorae). At the same time, the letter A, according to the then tradition, was decorated with a curl and looked like @. The American scholar Berthold Ullman suggested that the @ sign was invented by medieval monks to shorten the Latin word "ad", which was often used as a universal word meaning "on", "in", "in relation to", etc. In Spanish, Portuguese, French, the name of the symbol comes from the word "arroba" - an old Spanish measure of weight, approx. 15 kg., which was abbreviated on the letter with the @ sign.

The modern official name for the symbol "commercial at" comes from bills, for example, 7 widgets @ $2 each = $14, which translates to 7 widgets. 2$ = 14$. Since this symbol was used in business, it was placed on the keyboards of typewriters and from there migrated to the computer.

We owe the distribution of this symbol on the network to the forefather of e-mail, Tomlinson. He was the one who chose the @ symbol. When asked much later why he chose this particular icon, he replied simply: "I was looking on the keyboard for a character that could not appear in any name and cause confusion."
Such a symbol was needed by Tomlinson at the time when he was working on the creation of a messaging system in the Arpanet network (the progenitor of the Internet). In fact, he had to come up with a new addressing scheme that would identify not only the recipients, but also the computers on which their mailboxes were located. To do this, Tomlinson needed a separator, and his, in general, random choice fell on the @ sign. The first network address was [email protected]

In Russia, users most often refer to the “@” symbol as a “dog”, which is why e-mail addresses formed from personal names and surnames sometimes take on unexpected coloring. It is curious that this symbol is used in their work by both folk talents (for example, the joke: “The dog is gone, @ don’t offer”), and official jokers - KVN people (for example, “ [email protected]"). But still: why "dog"?

There are several versions of the origin of this funny name.
First, the badge really looks like a curled up dog.
Secondly, the abrupt sound of the English “at” is a bit like a dog barking.
Thirdly, with a fair amount of imagination, you can consider almost all the letters included in the word “dog” in the outlines of the symbol, well, perhaps, with the exception of “k”.
But the most romantic is the following legend: “Once upon a time, when computers were large and displays were exclusively text, there was a popular game with the simple name “Adventure” (“Adventure”). Its meaning was to travel through a computer-generated labyrinth in search of treasures and battles with harmful underground creatures. At the same time, the labyrinth on the screen was drawn with the symbols "!", "+" and "-", and the player, treasures and hostile monsters were indicated by various letters and icons. Moreover, according to the plot, the player had a faithful assistant - a dog who could be sent to the catacombs for reconnaissance. And it was denoted, of course, by the @ sign.
Whether this was the root cause of the now generally accepted name, or, conversely, the icon was chosen because it was already called that, the legend is silent about this.

In fairness, it should be noted that in Russia a “dog” is also called a dog, a frog, a bun, an ear, a ram, and even a kryakozyabra. In other countries, this symbol is associated with different objects.
The following is a far from complete list of how the "@" symbol is called in other countries.

- Bulgaria - "klomba" or "maimunsko a" (monkey A)

- Netherlands - "apenstartje" (monkey tail)

- Israel - "strudel" (whirlpool)

- Spain, France, Portugal - "arroba", "arrobase" (measure of weight)

- Germany - monkey tail, monkey ear, monkey, paperclip

- Italy - chiocciola" (snail)

- Denmark, Norway, Sweden - "snabel-a" (snout a) or elephant trunk (a with a trunk)

- Czech Republic, Slovakia - rollmops (marinated herring)

- America - cat

- China, Taiwan - little mouse

- Turkey - rose

- Serbia - "crazy a" or maimun (monkey)

- Vietnam - "crooked a"

- Ukraine - "ravlik" (snail), "doggie" or "doggy", "mavpochka" (monkey)

- Poland, Croatia, Romania, Slovenia, Holland - "malpa" (monkey)

- Finland - cat's tail

- Greece - little pasta

- Hungary - worm, tick

- Latvia - "at"

- Russia - in addition to the dog - a dog, a frog, a bun, an ear and a kryakozyabra.

As you can see, for many peoples, the @ sign evokes an association with a cozy animal, for some with an appetizing strudel or herring roll, the poetic Turks compared it with a flower, but the disciplined Japanese use the English “attomark” without any poetic comparisons.

As a child, we were taught to recognize the letters of our native language and most common mathematical signs and punctuation marks, such as dashes, hyphens -, quotation marks "", brackets () () and so on. However, we often come across signs whose meaning we do not know. In this article, we will talk about the name of a sign that you can often see in a letter, but you cannot understand its purpose.

Keyboard characters

First, let's talk about those signs that you can often find in typographic texts and on the Web. They are located on your keyboard.

The name comes from two English words: hash - lattice, tag - label. This mark is placed next to a word or phrase in a blog or social network and serves to identify a specific topic to which an entry, photo or video posted on the Internet is related. For example, if you posted a photo of a puppy on your blog, you could use the hashtags #puppy, #dog, #cute, etc. And if another user wants to see photos of puppies, he will only need to enter the hashtag #puppy in the search, and he will be able to see both yours and hundreds of other photos with puppies marked with the corresponding hashtag.

• & - Ampersand. This sign is used to denote a conjunction or, more simply, replaces the union "and". Surprisingly, this sign first began to be used before our era. It gained active distribution in the 8th century. first in handwritten texts, and from the middle of the 15th century. - in printed materials and was used to increase the speed of recording and compress the volume of written text. It is still used for the same purpose today.
• / - Slash, slash in computer science. This sign belongs to the category of non-alphabetic spelling signs along with the apostrophe (") and hyphen (-). According to the current established norms of the Russian language, it can be used to indicate the ratio of any quantities or parameters to each other (serves as an analogue of the fraction sign and indicates division ); can replace the union "and" and "or"; and can also be used in various abbreviations (railway - railway).
• * - Asterisk, asterisk. The scope of such a sign is very extensive. Here are just the main ones: used to create a footnote or comment in the text; three asterisks in a row delimit incoherent passages of text and can replace headings or a title; several asterisks in a row replace an unprintable word; asterisks also replace proper names in the text that should not be known to the reader or that do not matter for the thread of the story, etc.

Diacritics

Separately, it is worth talking about such a phenomenon as diacritical marks. These are symbols that are used in typography to change the usual style of a character, or are used in linguistics to indicate that a certain letter of the alphabet is not read according to general rules.

The most striking examples of diacritics in modern Russian are the superscript colon above the letter "ё" and the U-shaped superscript in the letter "y". There are not so many such signs in Russian. In other languages, there are much more diacritics:

• /-shaped stroke over the letter (á);
• \-shaped stroke above the letter (à);
• a cap over the letter (â, zh͡dzh);
• a bird above the letter (ž, ě);
• // above the letter (ő, ű);
• \ over the letter (ѷ);
• superscript circle (å);
• superscript dot (i, j, ṁ);
• tilde over letter (ã, ñ);
• a bar over the letter (ā);
• apostrophe (a");
• title (а҃);
• colon after letter (a:);
• various tails above, below and on the sides of the letters (Ҙ, Ȩ, Ҳ, Ҭ, ɦ, Ơ, Ư), etc.

I am glad to welcome dear users on the page of my blog. Many jargon from the global network has firmly entered our lives. These memes include cake, trouble, life hack, trolling, and so on. However, among all the widespread and gaining popularity of Internet jargon in Runet, the first place is occupied by “dog”.

This icon, familiar to the entire Internet audience, has an official name - "commercial at", and it looks like this: @. On the web, it is used to designate an address. It separates the username from the hostname. Therefore, everyone who has visited any site at least once has come across it. At the same time, it is called differently in different countries:

• Holland - monkey and tail, in the original apenstaartje;
• Ukraine - doggie;
• Spain - arroba, which means a measure of weight;
• Italy - snail, the original word is chiocciola;
• PRC - mouse;
• Denmark - elephant trunk and other names;
• Germany - the tail or ear of a monkey;
• Israel - strudel.

This is only a small part of the names of the @ symbol in different countries, and in Russia it is a "dog" for most users. Despite the fame, few people know why the "dog" is called that. The symbol is called so all the time, when, for example, they dictate their email address in a personal conversation or on the phone. All people have long been accustomed to this. Therefore, the other interlocutor understands everything and correctly writes down the voiced email address.

An exception may be a foreigner, who is more likely to go into a stupor, unless he lives in Russia or constantly communicates with Russian people. The thing is that the @ sign is called "dog" exclusively by Russian-speaking users. The history of the appearance of this symbol in the addresses of electronic mailboxes and on the “clave” of a computer is also interesting. This is what I will talk about next.

The correct pronunciation of the @ sign

Almost always, Russians pronounce the word "dog" when dictating their email address. It still represents the main official channel for contacts. The popularity of email is not affected even by a large number of instant messengers from different developers. Through e-mail, users often send official letters and exchange various media files, including photos and short videos.

When an e-mail address is transmitted verbally, it is at this point that the so-called "dog" problem appears. At the same time, it is absent when writing an email on paper or when it is transmitted using an SMS message. The problem is that the word "dog" is in certain situations like a curse. Therefore, many people have to think before pronouncing it. At the same time, some of them have a question: “why does the @ sign have such a name?”.

To fully answer this question, you need to understand everything in order. So, the @ symbol is really commonly called a "dog". Confirmation of this jargon is the use of this word both on television and in the press. However, the media is not always a role model for expressing one's thoughts and even behavior. Therefore, everyone needs to know how the @ symbol is officially called, so that if necessary, you can quickly convey to the interlocutor what you have in mind if, for example, he is a foreigner.

At the official level, the @ sign correctly sounds like "at". English-speaking users designate it with the word "at". This is where the pronunciation comes from. Moreover, in English this word is a preposition. In translation into Russian, it can have a different meaning. It directly depends on the constructed phrase. Therefore, in standard encodings, the symbol "dog" is specified as "commercial at".

English "at" translated into Russian means location. However, it can still be used as a preposition, for example, "in", "by", "on", and in some cases this English word can be used as "about". In connection with this translation, the @ symbol was chosen to denote electronic addresses. And then everything falls into place. So, having an email address, for example, it can be sorted into pieces: a user whose name is 12751013, on the mail.ru server.

However, we need to return to the question: “why is at commercial?”. Because some of the most meticulous accountants in the world, the British began to use the @ symbol as an abbreviation of the preposition "at" several centuries ago when compiling accounting documentation. For example, 11 rolls of fabric @ 2000 rubles = 22000 rubles. In other words, 11 rolls of 2000 rubles. will cost 22,000 rubles. This is why at is commonly considered a commercial pretext.

Its use has become so commonplace that with the invention of typewriters on such devices, the @ symbol has taken its own place in the string of numbers and punctuation marks. Subsequently, with the advent of personal computers, which inherited the layout from typewriters, the “dog” sign also began to be used on the keyboard. Now you know the path from the appearance of the @ symbol to the beginning of its use in designating electronic addresses that appeared in the 2nd half of the 20th century.

So anyway, why was "dog" chosen to split the email address? Here we need to clarify that this symbol is used not only in email, but also when writing a URL. In the latter case, @ is used to separate the username and password from the address of a particular page. However, this way of writing URLs is rarely used.

The @ sign has also found its place on Twitter. You can see him on this social network, which is a popular miniature blogging, when a response message is typed. This symbol must be written before the name of the responding user. After that, he migrated to modern templates for forums and other social platforms.

It was already mentioned earlier that using @ when writing an email address is quite logical in connection with the meaning of the preposition at. In other words, a person can voice their email like this: ivanov on mail.ru. This pronunciation of the email address does not contradict any rules and is 100% correct!

It is worth noting that the programmer Tomlinson came up with the idea of ​​recording email in the form it has now. This designation first appeared in 1971. The @ symbol separated the username from the server.

When the Russian layout is used on the computer, then in order to write “dogs”, it is first necessary to switch to English. This action is performed using special keys. For such purposes, the combination Shift + ALT is used. Shift + Control is also often used. In addition, switching can be done by clicking the language icon on the taskbar, selecting the desired layout.

Why is the name "dog" chosen?

There are various versions of why it is customary to call the @ sign in Runet a “dog”:

1. The symbol is very much like a dog curled up.
2. The abrupt pronunciation of "at" is a bit like a dog barking.
3. If you strain your imagination and carefully look at the outline of the sign, then you can see almost all the letters that are necessary to write the word "dog". The exception is "k".

In addition to these options, there is one legend. It has romantic overtones. So, many decades ago, when the first computers were large devices with displays that were exclusively text, people played the game "Adventure" (English name "Adventure"). In it, users went through a maze created by the PC. They needed to find treasures, while killing various creatures living underground.

Symbols such as "-", "+" and "!" were used to draw the labyrinth on the monitor. At the same time, different signs and letters were used to designate the player, treasures and monsters. The game was also attended by a dog, which was a faithful assistant to the playing person. He usually performed reconnaissance in the maze at the player's command. But it was the @ symbol that was used to designate it.

This legend is silent about whether it is the reason for the appearance of the name "dog" for the @ sign. It is also worth mentioning that among Russian-speaking users this symbol is also called:

• frog;
• ram;
• dog;
• bun;

The familiar name of the @ sign in Russia appeared in the 80s of the XX century. At this time, the computerization of the population began in the country. During this period, people in Russia began to gradually get to know what e-mail is. And those were only selected users.

Instead of a conclusion

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To understand exactly why the sign "dog" is so called, none of us today can be 100% able to recognize. Time is lost and tails will not be found. The name of the @ symbol has already become a tradition: I say it because everyone says it. Should we continue to use this name? Some may strongly disagree with this. Some, on the contrary, believe that the name "dog" makes us all mysterious personalities in the eyes of users from other countries, with the exception of the CIS countries (perhaps only for the time being).

However, foreigners are also not far behind us. Instead of "et", they use some of their own name, for example, snail. In many countries, users associate the @ symbol with an animal, in other states - with a herring roll or a delicious strudel.

But you, my readers, will now know exactly what is hidden behind the little squiggle in your e-mail address.

In the 1990s, when the @ sign was first tried to be translated into Russian, there were many equal options - “krakozyabra”, “squiggle”, “frog”, “ear” and others. True, at present they have practically disappeared, and the “dog” has spread throughout the Runet and has remained, because any language strives to have only one universal word for anything. The remaining titles remain marginal, although there may be a great many of them. For example, in English, the @ symbol is called not only the words commercial at, but also mercantile symbol, commercial symbol, scroll, arobase, each, about, etc. Where did the association between the main computer icon and a person's friend come from? For many, the @ symbol really does resemble a curled up dog.

There is an exotic version that the abrupt pronunciation of English at can resemble dog barking. However, a much more likely hypothesis links our symbol to the very old Adventure computer game. It had to travel through the maze, fighting with various unpleasant underground creatures. Since the game was textual, the player himself, the walls of the labyrinth, monsters and treasures were designated by various symbols (say, the walls were built from "!", "+" and "-"). The player in Adventure was accompanied by a dog that could be sent out on reconnaissance missions. It was denoted by the @ symbol. Perhaps it is thanks to this now forgotten computer game that the name "dog" has taken root in Russia.

The @ sign is everywhere in today's world, especially since it has become an integral part of an email address. But this symbol was part of the layout of the standard American typewriter long before the computer era, and became a computer symbol only because it was relatively little used. The @ sign is used in commercial calculations - in the meaning of "at the price" (at the rate). Let's say 10 gallons of oil at $3.95 per gallon would be shorthand: 10 gal of oil @ $3.95/gal. In English-speaking countries, the symbol is also used in science in the meaning of "at": for example, a density of 1.050 g/cm at 15 °C would be written: 1.050 g/cm @ 15 °C. In addition, the @ sign is loved and often used by anarchists due to its similarity to their symbol - "A in a circle."

However, its original origin is shrouded in mystery. From the point of view of the linguist Ullmann, the @ symbol was invented by medieval monks to shorten the Latin ad (“on”, “in”, “in relation to”, and so on), which is very similar to its current use. Another explanation is given by the Italian scientist Giorgio Stabile - he discovered this symbol in the records of the Florentine merchant Francesco Lapi for 1536 in the meaning of "amphora": for example, the price of one @ wine. Interestingly, the Spaniards and the Portuguese call the character in emails exactly “amphora” (arroba) - a word that the French, distorting, turned into arobase. However, in different countries there are a variety of names for the @ symbol, most often zoological. The Poles call it "monkey", the Taiwanese - "mouse", the Greeks - "duck", the Italians and Koreans - "snail", the Hungarians - "worm", the Swedes and Danes - "elephant trunk", the Finns - "cat's tail" or " meow sign, and the Armenians, like us, - "doggie". There are gastronomic names - "strudel" in Israel and "rollmops" (marinated herring) in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. In addition, often this symbol is simply called "crooked A", or "A with a curl", or, as the Serbs, "crazy A". However, the most surprising of the modern stories associated with the @ symbol occurred in China, where the sign is tritely called "A in a circle." A few years ago, a Chinese couple gave this name to a newborn. Perhaps the sign began to be perceived as a hieroglyph symbolizing technological progress, and they decided that it would bring happiness and success to the young inhabitant of the Middle Kingdom.