DELE

Dele is a proofreading instruction used to indicate that the marked material should be deleted. The word is derived from the Latin delere, meaning “to destroy,” with the imperative form dele meaning “delete.” It has long been part of editorial practice in manuscript proofs and early printing.

In traditional copy editing, a proofreader would annotate the page with the instruction dele to signal the compositor or typesetter to remove the specified text. The deletion could affect a sentence, paragraph, or a single character. The explicit note dele was commonly used in English-language editing conventions, and the mark could be accompanied by various marginal or above-the-line symbols depending on the era and publisher.

With the rise of digital typesetting and word processing, the explicit dele instruction is used less often in everyday editing. Modern workflows typically rely on delete commands, backspace, or digital tracking changes and comments. Nonetheless, the dele mark remains a recognizable component of historical editions, digitized archives, and some editorial manuals, serving as a clear example of traditional proofreading marks and the processes that preceded automated editing tools.

In summary, dele refers to a long-standing editorial command to remove text, rooted in Latin and carried through to early print practices, and it persists today as part of the historical vocabulary of proofreading.