German Braille

A German Braille index at the Nixdorfmuseum

In numerical order by decade, the letters are:

a	b	c en	d	e	f	g	h	i	j
k	l	m	n	o	p	q ll	r	s	t
u	v	x mm	y el	z	& ge	% es	em	ß ss	st
au	eu	ei	ch	sch	ein	er	ü	ö	w
	be	al	un	or	an	eh	tt	in	ar
-ig	äu	ä	ie	# ich	$ ck	-lich	-ach

The generic accent sign, ⠈, is used with foreign names such as ⠍⠕⠇⠊⠈⠑⠗⠑ Molière that have accented letters not found in German. There are numerous contractions and abbreviations.

Punctuation is as follows:

.[lower-alpha 1]

,

’

;

:

?

!

-

—

/

|

\

*

_

Only the first asterisk is marked with dot 6, so print *** is in braille ⠠⠔⠔⠔.

§

Art.

&

@

°

′

″

⠴ is the Artikel sign, marking an article of a document.

... „ ... “

... ‘ ... ’

... ( ... )

... [ ... ]

For the brackets of phonetic transcription, German Braille uses a modified form, ⠰⠶...⠰⠶.

Additional punctuation and symbols, especially mathematical, are explained in the external reference below.

Numbers are introduced with the sign ⠼. They are dropped to decade 5 for ordinals and for the denominator of fractions.

So, for example, ⠼⠙ is ⟨4⟩, while ⠼⠲ is ⟨4.⟩ (4th), and ⠼⠉⠲ is ⟨3⁄4⟩́.

(num.)

%

‰

The percent sign requires the number sign even after a number: ⠼⠃⠼⠴ ⟨2%⟩; otherwise it would look like the (undefined) fraction 2⁄0.

In a compound fraction, a repeat of the number sign separate the units from the fraction: ⠼⠁⠼⠁⠆ ⟨1+1⁄2⟩.

(num.)

(Caps)

(CAPS)

(ALL CAPS)

(l.c.)

(emphasis)

(end)

The emphasis sign (for italics, underline, or bold) is marked with an extra point, ⠠⠸, when it occurs in the middle of a word. It is doubled, ⠸⠸, when more than one word is emphasized, in which case the ending sign ⠠⠄ will be required at the end of the last word.

The all-caps sign is used for initialisms and the like. Doubled, it is used for all-cap text, such as titles, and the same ending sign, ⠠⠄, is used. Names with initials, such as J.S. Bach, do not require the cap sign. The lower-case sign ⠠ is used to mark mixed case or exceptions to expected capitalization; as such, it replaces the apostrophe that sets off the plural -s in print:

⠘⠊⠉⠠⠎ ⟨IC's⟩, ⠘⠍⠨⠓⠵ ⟨MHz⟩, ⠨⠛⠍⠃⠘⠓ ⟨GmbH⟩.

(Note the initialism sign can be used for a single letter.)

Lower-case metric units are marked as lower-case: ⠠⠅⠘⠺ ⟨kW⟩. This is useful, as it ends the scope of the number sign ⠼:

⠼⠁⠉⠚⠠⠓⠨⠏⠁ ⟨130 hPa⟩, ⠼⠁⠉⠚⠠⠅⠘⠧⠁ ⟨130 kVA⟩.

A sample of Moon type in various languages including German.

• Moon type is a simplification of the Latin alphabet for embossing. An adaptation for German-reading blind people has been proposed.