continuï

Continuï is a hypothetical typographic concept described as a diacritic mark intended to indicate textual continuity in Dutch-language typography and related orthographies. The term blends the notion of continuation with a diacritic-style sign on the letter i and is not part of official orthography. It has appeared in editorials and typography forums as a possible tool for clarifying how a morpheme or phrase continues across boundaries.

Design and usage would situate continuï as a diacritic placed above the letter i, functioning similarly to a diaeresis but signaling continuation rather than vowel separation. In practice, it could be used in compounds or across line breaks to aid reader parsing in dense layouts. Adoption would depend on font support, keyboard input, and encoding considerations, and it remains outside established standards.

Rationale for and against continuï centers on readability and typographic clarity. Proponents argue that it could help readers track ongoing concepts in long compounds or across line breaks, reducing ambiguity in complex text. Critics caution that introducing a new diacritic adds encoding and localization challenges, may hinder non-native reader comprehension, and could fragment typographic consistency across publications and platforms.

Relation to existing marks places continuï in the family of diacritics such as diaeresis and umlaut, which guide syllabification or pronunciation. Unlike the standard Dutch diaeresis used to separate vowel sounds within certain words, continuï would specifically signal continuation, not merely segmentation.

Status and influence: continuï remains a theoretical proposal with limited to no official adoption. It is primarily discussed in typography and orthography conversations as a thought experiment about how to represent continuation in written form. See also: diaeresis, orthography, typography, diacritic.