々

See also: 〻, 𠚤, マ, 龴, 𖿠, and 𖿡

々 U+3005, 々 IDEOGRAPHIC ITERATION MARK ← 〄 [U+3004] CJK Symbols and Punctuation 〆 → [U+3006]

Chinese

Alternative forms

• 〻 (in vertical writing)

Glyph origin

One theory holds that it is simplified from 仝, a variant of 同 (“same (used as iteration mark)”), written in cursive.

Iteration mark

々

1. (in horizontal writing, informal) An iteration mark denoting the repetition of the previous hanzi.

Usage notes

In Japanese, the symbol 々 is used in any kind of writing. In Chinese, it is sometimes used in casual horizontal writing (or calligraphy) to indicate a repeated character, but not in formal writing or in print. More often, 〻 is used (though still only casually), or sometimes the older 𖿣. Usually, however, the character is simply written twice, without the use of any of the above symbols.

Japanese

Alternative forms

• 〻 (in vertical writing, now rare)

Iteration mark

々 

1. An iteration mark denoting the repetition of the previous kanji; the repeated character does not necessarily have the same pronunciation as the first due to rendaku or more exceptionally, renjō.

   黙々 (mokumoku, “silent, mute, tacit”)

   早々 (hayabaya, “promptly”)

   佐々木 (sasaki, “Sasaki (a Japanese surname)”)

   昔々 (mukashimukashi, “once upon a time”)

   時々 (tokidoki, “occasionally, sometimes”)

   久々 (hisabisa, “long-absent”)

   色々 (iroiro, “various”)

   犬々 (inuinu, “dogs”)

   日々 (hibi, “daily”)

   島々 (shimajima, “islands”)

   所々 (tokorodokoro, “here and there”)

   人々 (hitobito, “people”)

Usage notes

In Japanese, this mark is formally called 漢字返し (kanji-gaeshi, “kanji repeater”) or 同の字点 (dō no jiten, “same-character mark”). More casually, it is called noma since it looks like a ligature of the katakana ノマ (noma), 繰り返し (kurikaeshi, “repeating”), 同じ (onaji, “same”, noun), or 同じく (onajiku, “same”, adverb).

々 is generally used within a word, and not across lexical boundaries. For example, 小(しょう)学(がっ)校(こう)校(こう)長(ちょう) (shōgakkō kōchō, “president of elementary school”) will not change into *小(しょう)学(がっ)校(こう)々(こう)長(ちょう) (shōgakkō kōchō). There are some exceptions:

1. in very common words such as ほげほげ町(ちょう)々(ちょう)会(かい) (Hogehogechō chōkai, “Foobar Town town meeting”)
2. if reduplication of the same kanji may imply that something that should happen once will happen again. For example, 結(けっ)婚(こん)式(しき)式(しき)場(じょう) (kekkonshiki shikijō, “wedding ceremony ceremony site”) may be misconstrued to mean two wedding ceremonies (and therefore a divorce of the marriage in question), so the second kanji may be replaced by 々.

A distinction may sometimes be made between this mark and the vertical iteration mark 〻, but in modern Japanese, 々 is commonly used in both horizontal and vertical writing.

々 is avoided at the beginnings of lines, and instead, the kanji is simply duplicated. However, this is not true for proper nouns containing 々 (e.g. the name 佐々木), which may straddle a line break.

See also

• (Japanese ligatures and scribal abbreviations) 〆(しめ) (shime), 𪜈(とも) (tomo), ゟ (yori), ヿ (koto), 𬼀(して) (shite), 〼(ます) (masu), ヶ (“graphical abbreviation for 箇”), 々 (“iteration mark”), ゝ (“iteration mark for hiragana”), ヽ (“iteration mark for katakana”) 〱 (“iteration mark for multiple kana”),