Wiktionary

“ ”


“ U+201C, “
LEFT DOUBLE QUOTATION MARK
← ‛
[U+201B] 		General Punctuation ” →
[U+201D]

” U+201D, ”
RIGHT DOUBLE QUOTATION MARK
← “
[U+201C] 		General Punctuation „ →
[U+201E]
See also: ‘ ’ and " "

Translingual

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Etymology

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A British substitute for « », which were not widely available in metal type when quotation marks were introduced from France.

Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. Encloses a quotation in some languages.
    John said, “Run!”

Usage notes

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In many countries, quotation marks are not standardized, with different publishers making different choices. Even where there is a standard, however, and that is something other than ⟨“ ”⟩, ⟨“ ”⟩ have been introduced with computers, as most word-processing software and keyboards follow English-language preferences. In many cases ⟨“ ”⟩ have become more commonly used than the traditional convention. This most commonly affects the positions and orientations of apostrophes and turned commas used as quotation marks, rather than guillemets.

See also

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quotation marks and quotation dashes by language (edit)
quotation marks - all matched-pairs
quotation marks and quotation dashes - all single characters
  • Curved double quotation marks: “ · ” · „ · ‟
  • Curved single quotation marks and apostrophes: ‘ · ’ · ‚ · ‛
  • Straight double quotation mark: "
  • Straight single quotation mark and apostrophe: '
  • Prime quotation marks: 〝 · 〞 · 〟
  • Guillemets: « · »
  • Single guillemets: ‹ · ›
  • Corner brackets: 「 · 」 · 『 · 』
  • Quotation dashes: — (em dash) · ― (horizontal bar) · – (en dash)

Further reading

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English

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. Encloses a quotation, title, ironic comment (scare quotes), nickname, gloss, or the mention of a word

Usage notes

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For simple quotations, ⟨“ ”⟩ are used in the United States while ⟨‘ ’⟩ are used in Britain. With nested quotations, American usage is ⟨“ ”⟩ for the outer set of marks and ⟨‘ ’⟩ for the inner (embedded) quotation or mention, while British usage tends to be the opposite, though there is variation in British usage. Regardless, usage switches back and forth between single and double quotation marks if there is further embedding.

With multi-paragraph quotations, the opening mark is used for each paragraph, but the closing mark only for the final paragraph.

Words, titles and sometimes quoted passages may be set in italic typeface rather than set off with quotation marks.

Chinese

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. (Mainland China, horizontal writing) Encloses a quotation.

Usage notes

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With vertical text, ⟨『 』⟩ is used. In Taiwan, ⟨「 」⟩ is used for both vertical and horizontal text.

French

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. Encloses an embedded (inner) quotation.

Usage notes

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An embbed (inner) quotation is enclosed with ⟨“ ”⟩, within ⟨« »⟩ for the outer quotation. This is the norm in France, but in Switzerland ⟨‹ ›⟩ are used for the embedded quotation. The languages of Switzerland use a common convention of ⟨« »⟩ for a simple or embedding quotation and ⟨‹ ›⟩ for an embedded quotation.

Greek

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Alternative forms

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. (dated) Encloses an embedded (inner) quotation.

Usage notes

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An embbed (inner) quotation was previously enclosed with ⟨“ ”⟩, within ⟨« »⟩. Single quotation marks are not used in Greek, due to the visual clash (and likely confusion) with the similar-looking diacritics with rough breathing.

Hindi

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. Encloses a quotation.

Usage notes

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The languages of India, including Modern Standard Hindi and Modern Standard Urdu, follow the American-English convention of ⟨“ ”⟩ for a simple or embedding quotation and ⟨‘ ’⟩ for an embedded quotation.

Portuguese

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. (Brazil) Encloses a quotation.
  2. (Portugal) Encloses an embedded (inner) quotation.

Usage notes

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  • Brazil follows American usage of ⟨“ ”⟩ for a simple or outer quotation, and ⟨‘ ’⟩ for an embedded quotation. For lines of dialogue, the quotation dash ⟨―⟩ is preferred.
  • Portugal follows French usage of ⟨« »⟩ for a simple or outer quotation, ⟨“ ”⟩ for an embedded quotation, and ⟨‘ ’⟩ for a doubly embedded quotation or mention.

Spanish

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Punctuation mark

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“ ”

  1. encloses an embedded (inner) quotation

Usage notes

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An embbed (inner) quotation is enclosed with ⟨“ ”⟩, within ⟨« »⟩ for the outer quotation.

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