On Tue, Sep 04, 2001 at 08:06:54PM +0200, Marco Cimarosti wrote:

> Hallo.
>
> Why is "ß" often called "es zet" in German?
>
> I know that today this sign is a ligature for "ss". But, in ancient times,
> was it also a ligature for "sz"? Or was it *only* a ligature for "sz"?

I've read arguments by Germans over where replacing the es zet with
sz is appropriate (as es zet -> ss can be ambigious), so it's
occasionally still used for sz.

I'm curious why it survived the Fraktur -> Antiqua transition, as it's
very clearly a long s-s ligature in the Fraktur. If it survived, why
didn't the long s?

--
David Starner - dstarner98@...
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