Capitalization Rules

Capitalization is the writing of a word with its first letter in uppercase

and the remaining letters in lowercase. Experienced writers are stingy
with capitals. It is best not to use them if there is any doubt.

Rule 1. Capitalize the first word of a document and the first word after
a period.

Rule 2. Capitalize proper nouns—and adjectives derived from proper

nouns.

Examples:
the Golden Gate Bridge
the Grand Canyon
a Russian song
a Shakespearean sonnet
a Freudian slip

With the passage of time, some words originally derived from proper
nouns have taken on a life, and authority, of their own and no longer
require capitalization.

Examples:
herculean (from the ancient-Greek hero Hercules)
quixotic (from the hero of the classic novel Don Quixote)
draconian (from ancient-Athenian lawgiver Draco)

The main function of capitals is to focus attention on particular

elements within any group of people, places, or things. We can speak
of a lake in the middle of the country, or we can be more specific and
 say Lake Michigan, which distinguishes it from every other lake on
earth.

Capitalization Reference List

 Brand names

 Companies

 Days of the week and months of the year

 Governmental matters
Congress (but congressional), the U.S.
Constitution (but constitutional), the Electoral College, Department of
Agriculture. Note: Many authorities do not
capitalize federal or state unless it is part of the official title: State
Water Resources Control Board, but state water board; Federal
Communications Commission, but federal regulations.

 Historical episodes and eras

the Inquisition, the American Revolutionary War, the Great Depression

 Holidays

 Institutions
Oxford College, the Juilliard School of Music

 Manmade structures
the Empire State Building, the Eiffel Tower, the Titanic

 Manmade territories
Berlin, Montana, Cook County
 Natural and manmade landmarks
Mount Everest, the Hoover Dam

 Nicknames and epithets

Andrew "Old Hickory" Jackson; Babe Ruth, the Sultan of Swat

 Organizations
American Center for Law and Justice, Norwegian Ministry of the
Environment

 Planets
Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, but policies
vary on capitalizing earth, and it is usually not capitalized unless it is
being discussed specifically as a planet: We learned that Earth travels
through space at 66,700 miles per hour.

 Races, nationalities, and tribes

Eskimo, Navajo, East Indian, Caucasian, African
American (Note: white and black in reference to race are lowercase)

 Religions and names of deities

Note: Capitalize the Bible (but biblical). Do not capitalize heaven, hell,
the devil, satanic.

 Special occasions
the Olympic Games, the Cannes Film Festival

 Streets and roads

Lowercase Reference List

 Here is a list of categories not capitalized unless an item contains a
proper noun or proper adjective (or, sometimes, a trademark). In such
cases, only the proper noun or adjective is capitalized.

 Animals
antelope, black bear, Bengal tiger, yellow-bellied sapsucker, German
shepherd

 Elements
Always lowercase, even when the name is derived from a proper
noun: einsteinium, nobelium, californium

 Foods
Lowercase except for brand names, proper nouns and adjectives, or
custom-named recipes: Tabasco sauce, Russian dressing, pepper crusted
bluefin tuna, Mandy's Bluefin Surprise

 Heavenly bodies besides planets

Never capitalize the moon or the sun.

 Medical conditions
Epstein-Barr syndrome, tuberculosis, Parkinson's disease

 Minerals

 Plants, vegetables, and fruits

poinsettia, Douglas fir, Jerusalem artichoke, organic celery, Golden
Delicious apples

 Seasons and seasonal data

spring, summertime, the winter solstice, the autumnal equinox,
daylight saving time
Rule 3. A thorny aspect of capitalization: where does it stop? When does
the Iraq war become the Iraq War? Why is the legendary Hope
Diamond not the Hope diamond? Everyone writes New York City, so
why does the Associated Press Stylebook recommend New York state?
There aren't always easy formulas or logical explanations. Research with
reference books and search engines is the best strategy.

In the case of brand names, companies are of little help, because they
capitalize any word that applies to their merchandise. Domino's
Pizza or Domino's pizza? Is it Ivory Soap or Ivory soap, a Hilton
Hotel or a Hilton hotel? Most writers don't capitalize common nouns
that simply describe the products (pizza, soap, hotel), but it's not always
easy to determine where a brand name ends. There is Time magazine
but also the New York Times Magazine. No one would argue
with Coca-Cola or Pepsi Cola, but a case could be made for Royal
Crown cola.

If a trademark starts with a lowercase word or letter (e.g., eBay,

iPhone), many authorities advise capitalizing it to begin a sentence.

Example: EBay opened strong in trading today.

Rule 4. Capitalize titles when they are used before names, unless the
title is followed by a comma. Do not capitalize the title if it is used after
a name or instead of a name.

Examples:
The president will address Congress.
Chairman of the Board William Bly will preside at the conference.
The chairman of the board, William Bly, will preside.
The senators from Iowa and Ohio are expected to attend.
Also expected to attend are Senators Buzz James and Eddie Twain.
 The governors, lieutenant governors, and attorneys general called
for a special task force.
Governor Fortinbrass, Lieutenant Governor Poppins, and Attorney
General Dalloway will attend.

NOTE

Out of respect, some writers and publishers choose to capitalize the

highest ranks in government, royalty, religion, etc.

Examples:
The President arrived.
The Queen spoke.
The Pope decreed.

Many American writers believe this to be a wrongheaded policy in a

country where, theoretically, all humans are perceived as equal.

Rule 5. Titles are not the same as occupations. Do not capitalize

occupations before full names.

Examples:
director Steven Spielberg
owner Helen Smith
coach Biff Sykes

Sometimes the line between title and occupation gets blurred. One
example is general manager: is it a title or an occupation? Opinions
differ. Same with professor: the Associated Press
Stylebook considers professor a job description rather than a title, and
recommends using lowercase even before the full name: professor
Robert Ames.

However, titles replacing someone's first name are generally capitalized.

Example: Here comes Professor Ames.

Rule 6a. Capitalize a formal title when it is used as a direct address. The
more formal the title, the more likely it is to be capitalized.

Examples:
Will you take my temperature, Doctor?
We're sorry to report, Captain, that we're headed for choppy
waters.
That's what you say, mister.
Good afternoon, sweetheart.
Rule 6b. Capitalize relatives' family names (kinship names) when they
immediately precede a personal name, or when they are used alone in
place of a personal name.

Examples:
I found out that Mom is here.
You look good, Grandpa.
Andy and Opie loved Aunt Bee's apple pies.

However, these monikers are not capitalized when they are used with
possessive nouns or pronouns, or when they follow the personal name,
or when they do not refer to a specific person.
 Examples:
My mom is here.
Joe's grandpa looks well.
The James brothers were notorious robbers.
There's not one mother I know who would allow that.
Rule 6c. Capitalize nicknames in all cases.

Examples:
Meet my brothers, Junior and Scooter.
I just met two guys named Junior and Scooter.
Rule 7. Capitalize specific geographical regions. Do not capitalize points
of the compass.

Examples:
We had three relatives visit from the West.
Go west three blocks and then turn left.
We left Florida and drove north.
We live in the Southeast.
We live in the southeast section of town.
Most of the West Coast is rainy this time of year. (referring to the
United States)
The west coast of Scotland is rainy this time of year.

Some areas have come to be capitalized for their fame or notoriety:

Examples:
I'm from New York's Upper West Side.
I'm from the South Side of Chicago.
You live in Northern California; he lives in Southern California.
Rule 8. In general, do not capitalize the word the before proper nouns.
 Examples:
We visited the Grand Canyon.
They're fans of the Grateful Dead.

In special cases, if the word the is an inseparable part of something's

official title, it may be capitalized.

Example: We visited The Hague.

Rule 9. It is not necessary to capitalize city, town, county, etc., if it
comes before the proper name.

Examples:
the city of New York
New York City
the county of Marin
Marin County
Rule 10a. Always capitalize the first word in a complete quotation, even
midsentence.

Example: Lamarr said, "The case is far from over, and we will win."
Rule 10b. Do not capitalize quoted material that continues a sentence.

Example: Lamarr said that the case was "far from over" and that
"we will win."
Rule 11. For emphasis, writers sometimes capitalize a midsentence
independent clause or question.

Examples:
One of her cardinal rules was, Never betray a friend.
It made me wonder, What is mankind's destiny?
 Rule 12. Capitalize the names of specific course titles, but not general
academic subjects.

Examples:
I must take history and Algebra 101.
He has a double major in European economics and philosophy.
Rule 13. Capitalize art movements.

Example: I like Surrealism, but I never understood Abstract

Expressionism.
Rule 14. Do not capitalize the first item in a list that follows a colon.

Example: Bring the following: paper, a pencil, and a snack.

For more on capitalization after a colon, go to "Colons," Rules 1, 3, and

4.

Rule 15. Do not capitalize "the national anthem."

Rule 16a. Composition titles: which words should be capitalized in titles

of books, plays, films, songs, poems, essays, chapters, etc.? This is a
vexing matter, and policies vary. The usual advice is to capitalize only
the "important" words. But this isn't really very helpful. Aren't all words
in a title important?

The following rules for capitalizing composition titles are virtually

universal.

 Capitalize the title's first and last word.

 Capitalize all adjectives, adverbs, and nouns.

 Capitalize all pronouns (including it).

 Capitalize all verbs, including the verb to be in all forms

(is, are, was, has been, etc.).

 Capitalize no, not, and the interjection O (e.g., How Long Must I
Wait, O Lord?).

 Do not capitalize an article (a, an, the) unless it is first or last in

the title.

 Do not capitalize a coordinating

conjunction (and, or, nor, but, for, yet, so) unless it is first or last in
the title.

 Do not capitalize the word to, with or without an infinitive,

unless it is first or last in the title.

Otherwise, styles, methods, and opinions vary; for instance, certain

short conjunctions (e.g., as, if, how, that) are capped by some,
lowercased by others.

A major bone of contention is prepositions. The Associated Press

Stylebook recommends capitalizing all prepositions of more than three
letters (e.g., with, about, across). Other authorities advise lowercase
until a preposition reaches five or more letters. Still others say not to
capitalize any preposition, even big words like regarding or underneath.

Hyphenated words in a title also present problems. There are no set

rules, except to always capitalize the first element, even if it would not
otherwise be capitalized, such as to in My To-go Order (some would
write My To-Go Order). Some writers, editors, and publishers choose
not to capitalize words following hyphens unless they are proper nouns
or proper adjectives (Ex-Marine but Ex-husband). Others capitalize any
word that would otherwise be capped in titles
(Prize-Winning, Up-to-Date).

Rule 16b. Many books have subtitles. When including these, put a colon
after the work's title and follow the same rules of composition
capitalization for the subtitle.

Example: The King's English: A Guide to Modern Usage

Note that A is capitalized because it is the first word of the subtitle.

Note that A is capitalized because it is the first word of the subtitle.

Suppose you are reviewing a book whose title on the cover is in capital
letters: THE STUFF OF THOUGHT. Beneath, in smaller capital letters, is
the subtitle, LANGUAGE AS A WINDOW INTO HUMAN NATURE. All sides would agree
that the main title should be written, The Stuff of Thought. But
depending on which capitalization policy you choose, the subtitle might
be any of the following:

Language As a Window Into Human Nature

Language as a Window Into Human Nature
Language As a Window into Human Nature
Language as a Window into Human Nature

Any title of more than two words can be a challenge. How would you
capitalize a title such as not yet rich? Since the first and last word in
any title are always capitalized, the only question is whether to cap yet.
In this case, yet is an adverb, and adverbs are always capped. So make
it Not Yet Rich.

Now suppose the title is rich yet miserable. This time yet is one of the
seven coordinating conjunctions (the others are and, or, nor, but, for,
and so). Since coordinating conjunctions are not capitalized in titles, the
right answer is Rich yet Miserable.

Here are two correctly capitalized titles: Going up the Road and Going
Up in a Balloon. In the first title, upis a preposition, and short
prepositions are not capitalized. In the second title, Up is an adverb and
should be capped.

Along the same lines, compare the following three sentences: I Got It off
the Internet, Please Put It Off for Today, and I Hit the Off Switch. In
the first example, the preposition off is lowercase. But the word must be
capped in the second example because put off, meaning "to postpone," is
a two-word phrasal verb (a verb of two or more words). One-word
verbs, helping verbs, and phrasal verbs are always capitalized. Off is also
capped in the third sentence because the word functions as an adjective
in that title, and adjectives are always capitalized.

Although the seven coordinating conjunctions are not capitalized, you

may have noticed there are many more than seven conjunctions in
English. Most of these are called subordinating conjunctions, because
they join a subordinate clause to a main clause. Familiar examples
include as, although, before, since, until, when.
 There are three approaches to capping subordinating conjunctions:
capitalize them all, lowercase them all, or capitalize them if they are
words of four letters or more. Take your pick.

Capitalizing composition titles is fraught with gray areas. Pick a policy

and be consistent.

TOP FIVE GRAMMAR BLOG POSTS

 Capitalization of Academic Degrees

 Into vs. In to

 Writing Dates and Times

 Apostrophes with Words Ending in "s"

 Titles of Books, Plays, Articles, etc.: Underline? Italics? Quotation Marks?

Capitalization, or capitalisation,[note 1] is writing a word with its

first letter as a capital letter (upper-case letter) and the
remaining letters in lower case in writing systems with a case
distinction. The term is also used for the choice of case in text.

Conventional writing systems (orthographies) for different

languages have different conventions for capitalization.

The systematic use of capitalized and uncapitalized words in

running text is called "mixed case". Conventions for the
capitalization of titles and other classes of words vary between
languages and, to a lesser extent, between different style guides.
 In some written languages, it is not obvious what is meant by the
"first letter": for example, the South-Slavic digraph "nj" is
considered as a single letter for the purpose of alphabetical
ordering (a situation that occurs in many other languages) and
can be represented by a single Unicode character, but at the start
of a word it is written "Nj": only the "N" is capitalized. In contrast,
in Dutch, when a word starts with the digraph "ij", capitalization
is applied to both letters, such as in the name of the city
of IJmuiden. There is a single Unicode character that combines the
two letters, but it is generally not used.

Contents

[hide]

 1Parts of speech
 1.1Pronouns
 1.2Places and geographic terms
 1.3Nouns
 1.4Adjectives
 1.5Acronyms
 1.6Titles
 2By context
 3By name of style
 3.1Sentence case
 3.2Title case
 3.3All caps
 4Special cases
 4.1Compound names
 4.2Accents
 4.3Digraphs and ligatures
 4.4Initial mutation
 4.5Case-sensitive English words
 5See also
 6References
 7Notes
 8Further reading
 9External links

Parts of speech[edit]
The generally accepted rules of capitalization vary between
different written languages. The full rules of capitalization
for English are complicated. The rules have also changed over time,
generally to capitalize fewer terms. To the modern reader, an
18th-century document uses initial capitals excessively. The
current rules can be found in style guides, although there is some
variation from one guide to another.

Owing to the essentially arbitrary nature

of orthographic classification and the existence of variant
authorities and local house styles, questionable capitalization of
words is not uncommon, even in respected newspapers and
magazines. Most publishers require consistency, at least within the
same document, in applying a specified standard: this is described
as "house style".

Pronouns[edit]
 In English, the subjective form of the singular
first-person pronoun, "I", is capitalized, along with all its
contractions such as I'll and I'm. Object and possessive forms
"me", "my", and "mine" are not.
 Many European languages traditionally capitalize nouns and
pronouns used to refer to God, including references to Jesus
Christ (reverential capitals): hallowed be Thy name, look what
He has done. Some English authors capitalize any word
referring to God: the Lamb, the Almighty; some capitalize
"Thy Name". These practices have become much less common
in English in the 20th and 21st centuries.
 Some languages capitalize the formal second-person pronoun:
 In German, the formal second person singular or plural
pronoun Sie is capitalized along with all its case-forms
(Ihre, Ihres, etc.), but these words are not capitalized when
used as third person feminine singular or plural pronouns.
Until the recent German spelling reform(s), the traditional
rules (which are still widely adhered to, although not
taught in schools) also capitalize the informal 2nd person
singular pronoun Du (and its derivatives, such as Dein)
when used in letters or similar texts, but this is no longer
required.
 Italian also capitalizes its formal pronouns, Lei and Loro,
and their cases (even within words,
e.g. arrivederLa "goodbye", formal). This is occasionally also
done for the DutchU, though this is formally only required
when referring to a deity and may be considered archaic.
 In Spanish, the abbreviations of the
pronouns usted and ustedes, Ud., Uds., Vd., and Vds., are
usually written with a capital.
 In Finnish, the second-person plural pronoun can be used
when formally addressing a single person, and in writing
the pronoun is sometimes capitalized as Te to indicate
special regard. In a more familiar tone, it is also possible to
capitalize the second-person singular pronoun Sinä.[1]
 Similarly, in Russian the formal second-person
pronoun Вы, and its oblique cases Вас, Вам etc., are
capitalized (usually in personal correspondence), also
in Bulgarian.
 Slovenian, Croatian, Serbian capitalize the formal
second-person pronoun Vi along with its oblique cases
(Vas, Vam, Vami) and personal pronoun (Vaš etc.) in
formal correspondence. Historically, the familiar
second-person pronoun ti and its cases (tebe, tebi, teboj)
were capitalized as well, but new orthography prohibits
such use.
 In Danish, the plural second-person pronoun, I, is
capitalized, but its other forms jer and jeres are not. This
distinguishes it from the preposition i ("in"). The formal
second-person pronoun is also capitalized in all its forms
(De, Dem, Deres), distinguishing it from the otherwise
identical third-person plural pronouns.
 In Norwegian, both second person singular and plural have
a capitalized alternative form
(De, Dem, Deres in Bokmål; De, Dykk, Dykkar in Nynorsk)
to express formality for both subject and object of a
sentence, but is very rarely used in modern speech and
writing.
 In formally written Polish, Czech, Slovak and Latvian,
most notably in letters and e-mails, all pronouns referring
to the addressee are capitalized. This includes Ty ("thou")
and all its related forms such as Twój and Ciebie. This
principle extends to nouns used formally to address the
addressee of a letter, such as Pan ("sir")
and Pani("madam").[citation needed]
 In Indonesian, capitalizing the formal second-person
pronoun Anda along with all references to the addressee,
such as "(kepada) Bapak/Ibu" ((to) Sir/Madam), is required
in practice of Ejaan Yang Disempurnakan (Perfected
Orthography).[2] However, some people do not know of or
 choose not to adhere to this spelling rule. In
contrast, Malayorthography used
in Malaysia, Singapore and Brunei does not require the
capitalization of anda.
 In Tagalog and its standard form, Filipino, the formal
second-person pronouns Kayo and Ninyo and their oblique
form Inyo are customarily and reverentially capitalized as
such, particularly in most digital and printed media
related to religion and its references. Purists who consider
this rule as nonstandard and inconsistent do not apply it
when writing.
 In Tajik, capitalization is used to distinguish the second
person formal pronoun Шумо from the second person
plural pronoun шумо.
 In Swedish, since du-reformen, the second person singular
pronoun du may be capitalized as Du when addressed
formally.
 Some languages capitalize a royal we (pluralis majestatis), e.g. it
is capitalized in German.
 The English vocative particle O, an archaic form of address,
e.g. Thou, O king, art a king of kings. However, lowercase o is
also occasionally seen in this context.

Places and geographic terms[edit]

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The capitalization of geographic terms in English text generally

depends on whether the author perceives the term as a proper
noun, in which case it is capitalized, or as a combination of an
established proper noun with a normal adjective or noun, in which
case the latter are not capitalized. There are no universally agreed
lists of English geographic terms which are considered as proper
nouns. The following are examples of rules that
some[which?] British and U.S. publishers have established in style
guides for their authors:
 In general, the first letter is capitalized for well-defined regions,
e.g. South America, Lower California, Tennessee Valley[3]
 This general rule also applies to zones of the Earth’s surface
(North Temperate Zone, the Equator)[4]
 In other cases, do not capitalize the points of the compass
(north China, south-east London) or other adjectives (western
Arizona, central New Mexico, upper Yangtze, lower Rio
Grande)
 Capitalize generic geographic terms that are part of a place
name (Atlantic Ocean, Mt. Muztagata, River Severn)
 Otherwise, do not capitalize a generic term that follows a
capitalized generic term (Yangtze River valley)
 Use lower case for plurals of generic terms (Gobi
and Taklamakan deserts)[citation needed]; but "the Dakotas"
 Only capitalize "the" if it is part of the (short-form) formal
place name (The Hague vs. the Netherlands, the Sudan, and
the Philippines)

Upper case: East Asia, South-East Asia, Central Asia, Central

America, North Korea, South Africa, the North Atlantic,
the Middle East, the Arctic, The Hague

Lower case: western China, southern Beijing, western Mongolia,

eastern Africa, northern North Korea, the central Gobi, the lower
Yangtze River.

Nouns[edit]
 The various languages and dialects in the High German family,
including Standard German and Luxembourgish, are the only
major languages using the Latin alphabet in which
all nouns are generally capitalized. This was also practiced in
other Germanic languages (mainly due to German influence):
 Danish, before the spelling reform of 1948
 Swedish, during the 17th and 18th centuries[5]
 English, during the 18th and 19th century (as in Gulliver's
Travels, and most of the original 1787 United States
Constitution)
 Some regional languages, such as Saterland Frisian
 In nearly all European languages, single-word proper nouns,
including personal names, are capitalized
(like France or Moses). Multiple-word proper nouns usually
follow the traditional English rules for publication titles (like
in Robert the Bruce).
  Where placenames are merely preceded by
the definite article, this is usually in lower case (as
in the Philippines).
 Sometimes, the article is integral to the name, and
thus is capitalized (as in Den Haag, Le Havre). However,
in French this does not occur for contractions du and
au (as in Je viens du Havre, "I come from Le Havre"). In
other European languages, it is much more common
for the article to be treated as integral to the name,
but it may not be capitalized (die Schweiz, les
Pays-Bas, yr Almaen etc.).
 A few English names are written with two lowercase
"f"s: ffrench, ffoulkes, etc. This originated as a variant
script for capital F.
 A few individuals have chosen not to use capitals in their
names, such as k.d. lang and bell hooks. E. E. Cummings,
whose name is often written without capitals, did not do
so himself: the usage derives from the typography used on
the cover of one of his books.[6][7]

easyJet A319 at Airport Amsterdam Schiphol.


 Most brand names and trademarks are capitalized
(e.g., Coca-Cola, Pepsi), although some have chosen to
deviate from standard rules (e.g., easyJet, id
Software, eBay, iPod) to be distinctive. When capitals
occur within a word, it is sometimes referred to as camel
case.
 In English, the names of days of
the week, months and languages are capitalized, as
are demonyms like Englishman, Arab. In other languages,
practice varies, but most languages other than German (which
capitalizes all nouns) do not.[8]
 In English-language addresses, the noun following the proper
name of a street is capitalized, whether or not it is abbreviated:
"Main Street", "Fleming Ave.", "Montgomery Blvd.", but in
French, street names are capitalized when they are proper
names; the noun itself (Rue, Place) is normally not
capitalized: rue de Rivoli, place de la Concorde.
 In Italian the name of a particular concept or object is
capitalized when the writer wants to emphasize its
importance and significance.[9]
 Capitalization is always used for most names of taxa used
in scientific classification of living things, except
for species-level taxa or below. Example: Homo sapiens
sapiens.
 Controversially, some authors capitalize common names of
some animal and plant species. As a general rule, names are
not capitalized, unless they are part of an official list of names,
in which case they have become proper nouns and are
capitalized. This is most common for birds[10] and fishes.
Names referring to more than one species (e.g., horse or cat)
are always in lowercase. Botanists generally do not capitalize
the common names of plants, though individual words in
plant names may be capitalized for another reason: (Italian
stone pine). See the discussion of official common names
under common name for an explanation.
 Common nouns may be capitalized when used as names for the
entire class of such things, e.g. what a piece of work is
Man. French often capitalizes such nouns as l'État (the state)
and l'Église (the church) when not referring to specific ones.
 Names by which gods are known are capitalized,
including God, Athena, and Vishnu. The word god is generally
not capitalized if it is used to refer to the generic idea of
a deity, nor is it capitalized when it refers to multiple gods,
e.g. Roman gods. There may be some confusion
because Judaism, Christianity, and Islam rarely refer to deity
by a specific name, but simply as God (see Writing divine
names). Other names for the God of these three Abrahamic
faiths, such as Elohim, Yahweh, and Lord, are also capitalized.
 While acronyms have historically been written in all-caps,
British usage is moving towards capitalizing only the first
letter in cases when these are pronounced as words
(e.g. Unesco and Nato), reserving all-caps for initialisms (e.g.
UK, USA, UNHCR).
 In life stance orthography, in order to distinguish life
stances from general -isms. For instance, Humanism is
distinguished from humanism.[11]
 In legal English, defined terms that refer to a specific entity,
such as "Tenant" and "Lessor", are often capitalized. More
specifically, in legal documents, terms which are formally
defined elsewhere in the document or a related document
(often in a schedule of definitions) are capitalized to indicate
that that is the case, and may be several words long, e.g. "the
Second Subsidiary Claimant", "the Agreed Conditional Release
Date".
 Most English honorifics and titles of persons, e.g. Sir, Dr
Watson, Mrs Jones, His Royal Highness the Duke of Edinburgh.
This does not apply where the words are not titles; e.g. Watson
is a doctor, Philip is a duke.

Adjectives[edit]
 In English, adjectives derived from proper nouns (except the
names of characters in fictional works) usually retain their
capitalization – e.g. a Christian church, Canadian whisky,
a Shakespearean sonnet, but not a (Quixotism)
quixotic mission nor malapropism. Where the original capital
is no longer at the beginning of the word, usage
varies: anti-Christian, and
either Presocratic, pre-Socratic, Pre-Socratic or presocratic.
Never preSocratic – a hyphen must precede a capital in a
compound word.
 Such adjectives do not receive capitals in French
(socratique, présocratique), Spanish (socrático, presocrático),
Swedish (sokratisk, försokratisk), Polish
(sokratejski, presokratejski) and partly in German
(sokratisch, präsokratisch, but Ohm'sches Gesetz). In German,
if the adjective becomes a noun by using an article or numeral
in front of it (das/die Bunte (the colorful thing(s)), eine
Schöne (a beautiful one)), it is capitalized like any other noun,
as are nouns formed from proper nouns (der Urgoethe). The
same applies to verbs (das Laufen (the (practice of)
running), das Spazierengehen (the (practice of) going for a
walk)).
 Whether geographic adjectives – adjectives referring to cities,
countries and other geographic places – are capitalized in
German depends on their ending: Geographic adjectives
ending in "-er" in their base form are capitalized, others are
not. This can feel strange where both forms of the adjective
 exist for a particular place. For example, one can refer to
something being from Mecklenburg by calling either it
"Mecklenburger" or "mecklenburgisch".
 Adjectives referring to nationality or ethnicity are not
capitalized in German, French or Czech, even though nouns
are: ein kanadisches Schiff, un navire canadien, kanadská loď,
a Canadian ship; ein Kanadier, un Canadien, Kanaďan, a
Canadian. Both nouns and adjectives are capitalized in English
when referring to nationality or ethnicity.

Acronyms[edit]
Acronyms are usually capitalized, with a few exceptions:

 Acronyms which have become regular words such

as laser and scuba.
 Some acronyms of proper nouns in which function words are
not capitalized, such as TfL (Transport for London) and LotR
(The Lord of the Rings).

Titles[edit]
See also: Letter case § Headings and publication titles

The titles of many English-language artistic works (plays, novels,

essays, paintings, etc.) capitalize the first word and the last word
in the title.[citation needed] Additionally, most other words within
a title are capitalized as well; articles and coordinating
conjunctions are not capitalized.[citation needed] Sources disagree
on the details of capitalizing prepositions.[12] For example,
the Chicago Manual of Style recommends rendering all
prepositions in lowercase,[13] whereas the APA style guide
instructs: Capitalize major words in titles of books and articles
within the body of the paper. Conjunctions, articles, and short
prepositions are not considered major words; however, capitalize
all words of four letters or more.[14]

In other languages, such as the Romance languages, only the first

word and proper names are capitalized.

By context[edit]
 In some modern European languages, the first word in
a sentence is capitalized, as is the first word in any quoted
sentence. (For example, in English: Nana said, "There are ripe
watermelons in the garden!") In some European languages, the
first word in a sentence is capitalized, the first word in any
quoted sentence, as well as all nouns regardless of position (for
 example, in German: Nana sagte: „Im Garten gibt es reife
Wassermelonen!“).
 The first word of a sentence is not capitalized in most
modern editions of ancient Greek and, to a lesser
extent, Latin texts. The distinction between lower and
upper case was not introduced before the Middle Ages; in
antiquity only the capital forms of letters were used.
 For some items, many style guides recommend that initial
capitalization be avoided by not putting the item at the
beginning of a sentence, or by writing it in lowercase even
at the beginning of a sentence. Such scientific terms have
their own rules about capitalization which take precedence
over the standard initial capitalization rule. For
example, pH would be liable to cause confusion if
written PH, and initial m and M may even have different
meanings, milli and mega, for example 2 MA
(megamperes) is a billion times 2 mA (milliamperes).
Increasingly nowadays, some trademarks and company
names start with a lower-case letter, and similar
considerations apply.
 When the first letters of a word have been omitted and
replaced by an apostrophe, the first letter in a sentence is
usually left uncapitalized in English and certain other
languages, as "'tis a shame ..."
 Traditionally, the first words of a line of verse are capitalized in
English, e.g.:
Meanwhile the winged Heralds, by command
Of sovereign power, with awful ceremony
And trumpet's sound, throughout the host proclaim
A solemn council forthwith to be held
At Pandemonium, the high capital
Of Satan and his peers. [...] (Milton, Paradise Lost I:752–756)
 Modernist poets often ignore or defy this convention.
 In the U.S., headlines and titles of works typically use title case,
in which certain words (such as nouns, adjectives and verbs)
are capitalized and others (such as prepositions and
conjunctions) are not.

By name of style[edit]
The following names are given to systems of capitalisation:

Sentence case[edit]
"The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog."
The standard case used in English prose. Generally equivalent to
the baseline universal standard of formal English orthography
mentioned above; that is, only the first word is capitalised, except
for proper nouns and other words which are generally capitalised
by a more specific rule.

Title case[edit]
"The Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over the Lazy Dog."
or
"The Quick Brown Fox Jumps Over The Lazy Dog."
Also known as headline style and capital case. All words
capitalized, except for certain subsets defined by rules that are not
universally standardized, often minor words such as "the" (as
above), "of", or "and". The standardization is only at the level of
house styles and individual style manuals. (See Headings and
publication titles.) A simplified variant is start case, where all
words, including articles, prepositions, and conjunctions, start
with a capital letter.

All caps[edit]
"THE QUICK BROWN FOX JUMPS OVER THE LAZY DOG."
Also known/written as "all-caps". Capital letters only. This style
can be used for headlines and book or chapter titles at the top of a
book page. It is commonly used in transcribed speech to indicate
that a person is shouting, or to indicate a hectoring and obnoxious
speaker.[15][16] For this reason, it is generally discouraged. Long
spans of Latin-alphabet text in all upper-case are harder to read
because of the absence of the ascenders and descenders found in
lower-case letters, which can aid recognition.[17][18] In
professional documents, a commonly preferred alternative to all
caps text is the use of small caps to emphasise key names or
acronyms, or the use of italics or (more rarely) bold.[19] In
addition, if all caps must be used it is customary in headings of a
few words to slightly widen the spacing between the letters, by
around 10% of the point height. This practice is known as tracking
or letterspacing.[20]

Special cases[edit]
Compound names[edit]
 In German, the particle von (meaning "of", pronounced [fɔn])
or genannt (meaning "named") in a surname (e.g. Alexander
 von Humboldt) is not capitalized (unless it is the first letter of
a sentence).
 In Swedish borrowed particles like von or the Swedish
particles av and af is not capitalized, even if it is the first
letter of a sentence.
 In Dutch, all particles like van, or de, or der, or ter in a
surname are capitalized unless a given name or initial precedes
it. With compound particles like van der only the first one is
capitalized. However, particles are capitalized in Belgium,
except when introducing a title of nobility or when use of the
lower case has been granted to some noble family. Thus in a
sentence about the location of Van Gogh's most productive
period:
 Zijn beste werken maakte Vincent van Gogh in
Frankrijk would be, without the given name Vincent
 Zijn beste werken maakte Van Gogh in Frankrijk
 In Dutch, ’t, ’n, or ’s are never capitalized, even at the start of
sentences — capitalization begins with the first complete word
of the sentence. They are short for the articles het, een and
the old possessive form des. Examples: ’s-Gravenhage, ’t
Harde.[citation needed]. In poetry, ’k, the shortened /
unemphasized form of ik ("I") follows the same rule.
 In English, practice varies when the name starts with a particle
with a meaning such as "from" or "the" or "son of".
 Some of these particles (Mac, Mc, M, O) are always
capitalized; others (L’, Van) are usually capitalized; still
others often are not (d’, de, di, von). The compound
particle de Lais usually written with the 'L' capitalized but
not the 'd'.[21]
 The remaining part of such a name, following the particle,
is always capitalized if it is set off with a space as a
separate word, or if the particle was not capitalized. It is
normally capitalized if the particle is Mc, M, or O. In other
cases (including Mac), there is no set rule
(both Macintyre and MacIntyre are seen, for example).

Accents[edit]
In most languages that use diacritics, these are treated the same
way in uppercase whether the text is capitalized or all-uppercase.
They may be always preserved (as in German) or always omitted
(as in Greek) or often omitted (as in French).[22] Some attribute
this to the fact that diacritics on capital letters were not available
earlier on typewriters, and it is now becoming more common to
preserve them in French and Spanish (in both languages the rule is
to preserve them,[23] although in France and Mexico, for instance,
schoolchildren are often erroneously taught that they should not
add diacritics on capital letters).

However, in the polytonic orthography used for Greek prior to

1982, accents were omitted in all-uppercase words, but kept as
part of an uppercase initial (written before rather than above the
letter). The latter situation is provided for by title-case characters
in Unicode. When Greek is written with the present
day monotonic orthography, where only the acute accent is used,
the same rule is applied. The accent is omitted in all-uppercase
words but it is kept as part of an uppercase initial (written before
the letter rather than above it). The dialytika (diaeresis) should
also always be used in all-uppercase words (even in cases where
they are not needed when writing in lowercase, e.g. ΑΫΛΟΣ —
άυλος).

Digraphs and ligatures[edit]

Some languages treat certain digraphs as single letters for the
purpose of collation. In general, where one such is formed as
a ligature, the corresponding uppercase form is used in
capitalization; where it is written as two separate characters, only
the first will be capitalized. Thus Oedipus or Œdipus are both
correct, but OEdipus is not. Examples with ligature
include Ærøskøbing in Danish, where Æ/æ is a completely
separate letter rather than merely a typographic ligature (the
same applies in Icelandic); examples with separate characters
are Llanelli in Welsh, where Ll is a single letter; and Ffrangeg in
Welsh where Ff is equivalent to English F (whereas
Welsh F corresponds to English V).[24] Presentation forms,
however, can use doubled capitals, such as the logo of the National
Library of Wales (Llyfrgell Genedlaethol Cymru). The position in
Hungarian is similar to the latter.

 An exception is the Dutch letter IJ. Both components are

capitalized even though they are printed separately when
using a computer, as in IJsselmeer. In the past the letter was
written as Y, and this still survives in some surnames.
 A converse exception exists in the Croatian alphabet, where
digraph letters (Dž, Lj, Nj) have mixed-case forms even when
written as ligatures.[25] With typewriters and computers,
these "title-case" forms have become less common than
2-character equivalents; nevertheless they can be represented
as single title-case characters in Unicode (Dž
, Lj, Nj).
 In Czech the digraph ch (usually considered as a single letter)
can be capitalized in two ways: Ch or CH. In general only the
first part is capitalized (Ch), unless the whole text is written in
capital letters (then it is written CH). In acronyms both parts
are usually capitalized, such as VŠCHT for Vysoká škola
chemicko-technologická (University of Chemistry and
Technology). However, the practice is not unified when writing
initial letters of personal names (first name and surname), for
example Jan Chudoba can be abbreviated
both J. Ch. or J. CH.[26]

Initial mutation[edit]
In languages where inflected forms of a word may have extra
letters at the start, the capitalized letter may be the initial of the
root form rather than the inflected form. For example, in Irish, in
the placename Sliabh na mBan, "(the) mountain of the women"
(anglicized as Slievenamon), the word-form
written mBan contains the genitive plural of the noun bean,
"woman", mutated after the genitive plural definite article (i.e.,
"of the"). The written B is mute in this form.

Other languages may capitalize the initial letter of the

orthographic word, even if it is not present in the base, as with
definite nouns in Maltese that start with certain consonant
clusters. For example, l-Istati Uniti (the United States) capitalize
the epenthetic I, even though the base form of the word —
without the definite article — is stati.

Case-sensitive English words[edit]

In English, there are a few capitonyms, which are words whose
meaning (and sometimes pronunciation) varies with
capitalization.

See also[edit]
 CamelCase
 Capitalization of "Internet"
 Letter case
 Orthography
 Sentence case
 Capitalization conspiracy

References[edit]
1. Jump up^ "Teitittely: oletteko kokeillut tätä?". Institute for
the Languages of Finland. Retrieved 6 March 2017.
2. Jump up^ (Indonesian) General Guide to Perfected Spelling
of the Indonesian Language, Section: Capital Letters -
from Indonesian Wikisource
3. Jump up^ Economist Style Guide, Capitalization –
Places and for administrative areas (West Virginia, East
Sussex)
4. Jump up^ Council of Science Editors, Style Manual
Committee. Scientific Style and format: the CSE manual
for authors, editors, and publishers, 7th ed. 2006. Section
9.7.3, Pg. 120. ISBN 978-0-9779665-0-9
5. Jump up^ Daniel Solling (June 2009). "Små bokstäver
ökade avståndet till tyskarna" (in Swedish).
Språktidningen. Retrieved 28 June 2016.
6. Jump up^ See E. E. Cummings: Name and
capitalization for further discussion.
7. Jump up^ Friedman, Norman (1992). "Not "e. e.
cummings"". Spring. 1: 114–121. Retrieved December
13, 2005.
8. Jump up^ Capitalization rules for days, months,
demonyms and language-names in many
languagesfrom Meta-wiki
9. Jump up^ See the entry Maiuscolo at the Italian
Wikipedia for descriptions of various rules of capitalization
in Italian and for references.
10. Jump up^ Worldbirdnames.org Archived September 28,
2007, at the Wayback Machine.
11. Jump up^ Doerr, Edd (November–December 2002).
"Humanism unmodified". The Humanist. American
Humanist Association. 62 (6): 1–2.
12. Jump up^ "Writer's Block - Writing Tips - Capitalization in
Titles". Writersblock.ca. Archived from the original on
October 9, 2012. Retrieved 2012-10-28. Archived.
13. Jump up^ "Capitalization, Titles". Chicagomanualofstyle.org.
Retrieved 2012-10-28.
14. Jump up^ [1]
15. Jump up^ Butterick, Matthew. "All Caps". Practical
Typography.
16. Jump up^ Ilene Strizver (2011). "ALL CAPS: To set or not
to set?". Fonts.com. Monotype Imaging. Retrieved 21
June 2011.; Cohen, Noam (4 February 2008). "Is Obama
 a Mac and Clinton a PC?". New York Times. Retrieved 29
January 2011. Jason Santa Maria, creative director of
Happy Cog Studios, which designs Web sites, detected a
basic breach of netiquette. “Hillary’s text is all caps, like
shouting,” he said.
17. Jump up^ Wheildon, Colin (1995). Type and Layout: How
Typography and Design Can Get your Message Across - Or
Get in the Way. Berkeley: Strathmoor Press.
p. 62. ISBN 0-9624891-5-8.
18. Jump up^ Nielsen, Jakob. "Weblog Usability: The Top Ten
Design Mistakes". Nielsen Norman Group. Retrieved 29
July 2015.
19. Jump up^ Butterick, Matthew. "Small caps". Practical
Typography. Retrieved 29 July 2015.
20. Jump up^ Butterick, Matthew. "Letterspacing". Practical
Typography. Retrieved 29 July 2015.
21. Jump up^ Oxford Manual of Style, R. M. Ritter ed., Oxford
University Press, 2002
22. Jump up^ Chicago Style Q&A: Special Characters
23. Jump up^ Accentuation des majuscules Questions de
langue : Académie française
24. Jump up^ Lewis, H (ed) Collins-Spurrell Welsh
Dictionary Collins UK 1977 p.
10. ISBN 0-00-433402-7
25. Jump up^ Vladimir Anić, Josip Silić: "Pravopisni priručnik
hrvatskog ili srpskog jezika", Zagreb, 1986 (trans. Spelling
handbook of Croato-Serbian language)
26. Jump up^ "Z dopisů jazykové poradně". Naše řeč. 83 (4):
223–224. 2000.

Notes[edit]
1. Jump up^ see spelling differences

Further reading[edit]
 Council of Science Editors, Style Manual Committee. Scientific
Style and format: the CSE manual for authors, editors, and
publishers, 7th ed. Reston (VA): The Council; 2006. Section
9.7.3, Pg. 120

External links[edit]
 Look
up capitalization in
Wiktionary, the free
dictionary.

 Capitalization Rules for Song Titles at the Aichi Institute of

Technology
 Capitalize My Title, an automatic title capitalization tool
 Text::Capitalize, a Perl module for English capitalization
 Lingua::EN::NameCase, a Perl module for Western
European name capitalization
 Bilingual Experiments on Automatic Recovery of Capitalization
and Punctuation of Automatic Speech Transcripts

Categories:

 Orthography
 Typesetting
 Typography
 Capitalization

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