Shorthand: Summary Index

Now that I’m feeling more comfortable with the raw notations of shorhand and many of its core abbreviations, I’m working to understand some of the more advanced concepts and abbreviations (intersection, “k” for con-, cum-, contr- prefix, etc.)

To help things out, I thought I’d create a table that logs what happens in many of these core “statements” of the Anniversary edition. I love the way the Gregg is written, it reminds me of my logic book or my Latin grammars (dating from the same era) where rules were given with identifying numbers and very little else. They didn’t do a lot of text in _text_books of that era.

Location Type Summary
1 General Shorthand is written by sound
2 Letter Inventory of consonants
3 General Writing motion
4 General Phrasing of short forms allows for speed and is permissible
5 Punctuation Period, Paragraph, Interrogation, Dash, Hyphen, Parenthesis
6 Drill  
7 Letter a and e
8 General Marking vowels
9 General Writing motion
10 General Left motion versus right motion
11 Joining At the beginning or end of a curve, the circle is placed inside the curve
12 Motion At the beginning or end of a line, circle is written with right motion
13 Practice  
14 Joining Where an angle or a point is formed at 2 consonants, circle goes outside; its leftmost extreme rotating counterclockwise to “free” it
15 Joining Where two straight strokes, or similar motions join, retain flushness of the circle
16 Omission Non-contributing vowels may be dropped (although this is rather arbitrary — sgh)
17 Motion Between straight strokes, circles are joined with right motion
18 Joining Between opposite curves, the circle is bent back on the first curve
19 Joining kr and gl are equal length curves and have their “ess” flattened
20 Joining gr and kl, uneven lengths, look like cursive y and h
21 Joining rk and lk, even lengths, look flattened
22 Letter th is curved and, so common, takes a left curve and a right curve
23 Brief Forms Preliminary List
24 Business Abbreviations Mr., Market (mr) & Yours Truly (yt) & Dear Sir, desire (ds)
25 Practice  
26 Blended Consonant: d, t d and t blend thus: ded, ted, det
27 Blended Consonant: m,n men, mem, min, and mun
28 Frequent Word Drill  
29 Brief Forms  
30 Phrasing Principles  
31 Phrase Drill  
32 Reading Practice  
33 Writing Practice  
34 Downward Characters  
35 Downward Characters s and sh are very short
36 Important Blendings  
37 Important Blendings pr, pl
38 Important Blendings br, bl
39 Important Blendings fr, fl
40 Frequent Word Drill  
41 Brief Forms  
42 Brief Forms As prefixes: every and after are shortened from their normal word usage to ev and af
43 Brief Forms been after a helping verb is abbreviated with b
44 Business Abbreviations Dear Madam (dm); Very truly yours (vyu); Yours very truly (uvt)
45 Reading Practice  
46 THE SIGN FOR s Two motions: right-s and left-s
47 THE SIGN FOR z Use s, but if you need to show, a down left dash underneath means ‘z’
48 S and the line of writing When ’s’ opens a word, before a consonant, the consonant starts on the line of writing
49 INITIAL AND FINAL S MEMORIZE: Before and After: PBRL; After: TDNMO (Lauren drinks PBR with Ted (Cruz) and Mo Tucker)
50 Frequent Word Drill  
51 S BETWEEN STROKES MEMORIZE: When a circle vowel precedes ’s’, treat the ’s’ as part of the previous consonant; when a circle vowel follows an ’s’, treat the ’s’ as part of it
52 Blend “ses” sound is a blend of two ’s’ tokens; this is poorly explained in the book: the secret is follow the rule for placing your final ’s’ and then after it put the opposite s. Consider ‘case’ which ends with a left-s, therefore add a right-s; consider ‘senses’ here the ’n’ occasions left-s and then right-s
53 Brief Form List  
54 Abbreviation -thing is expressed by ·
55 Rule Plural of a brief form ending in ’s’ requires you simply to double the previous motion
56 Practice  
57 Letter ‘x’ is expressed by ’s’ with a modified slant (closer to horizontal)
58 Abbreviation -shun is expressed by ‘ish’ or /
59 Abbreviation Past tense is expressed by a disjoint t, else a t, d, or disjoint d
60 Brief Form List  
61 Rule Brief forms can be prefixes
62 Frequent Phrases  
63 Practice  
64 Practice  
65 (Here: 2019-03-16) Letter The “O”-Hook: rot / raw / wrote
66 Frequent Word  
67 Rule IMPORTANT: O-hook before n, m, r, l modifies to a 1 o’clock dip aligned o
68 Frequent Phrases  
69 Brief Form List  
70 Practice  
71 Rule Before and after straight consonants or between straight consonants, a left-motion vowel indicates vowel + r
72 Note  
73 Frequent Word  
74 Rule Pluralize left-motion vowels by making them loops
75 Brief Form List  
76 Abbreviation After abbreviated words OR those ending with left motion strokes, disjoined r expresses “-er,” “-or”
77 Practice  
78 (Here: 2019-04-29) Rule Before and after o,r,l use left-motion th
79 Note  
80 Abbreviation con, com, coun, cog → k
80 Abbreviation ly → small circle à la e
80 Abbreviation -ily, -ally → loop
81 Abbreviation ‘common’, ‘connote’ are very long mm and nn
82 Abbreviation After a circle vowel, -ly is a small loop opposite
83 Some brief forms ending in a loop are pluralized by s at the terminus of the loop
84 Abbreviation Phrasing Before words beginning with (1) a downward character or (2) o, r, l the word ’to’ is expressed by t
85 Abbreviation Phrasing in phrases ‘as’ is s
86 Abbreviation Phrasing in phrases ‘able’ is a
87 Frequent Phrases  
88 Brief Form List  
88 Practice  
89 Practice  
90 Practice  
91 Letter The OO Hook
92 Frequent Word  
93 Brief Form List The combination us is written without an angle at the beginning of words, or when it follows a downstroke or k, g, as in us, shoes, campus, cousin, etc.
94 Abbreviation OO-hook is turned under (1) after -n, -m OR (2) -k, -g when followed by -r, -l
95 Brief Form List  
96 Practice  
97 Letter METHOD OF “W”
98 Word Drill  
99 Letter W in Words: a dash beneath the following vowel
100 Rule W before h or a or u is a · close to the next character
101 Frequent Phrases  
102 Brief Forms  
103 Practice  
104 Letter Y Y has the sound of the long e, as in yacht, yoke, and when followed by a hook vowel is expressed by the small circle. Ye, as in year, yet, is expressed by a small loop; ya, by a large loop.
105 Letter -NG and -NK are two slants like \
106 Abbreviation The vowel is omitted in the prefixes en, in, un, em, im when the prefix is followed by a consonant
106 Abbreviation The suffix ings is expressed by a left s
106 Abbreviation Suffix ingly by a small circle substituted for the ing-dot
107 Abbreviation Negative words beginning with in, un, im in which the n or m is doubled are distinguished from the positive forms by omitting one of the doubled consonants and inserting the initial vowel
108 Frequent Phrases  
109 Brief Forms  
110 Practice  
111 Practice  
112 Letter(Here: 2019-08-12) DIPTHONGS: FUME: e with a w
112 Letter DIPTHONGS: NOW: a with a w
112 Letter DIPTHONGS: OIL: u with a long right arm to an e
112 Letter DIPTHONGS: DIE: Big I
113 Drill  
114 Rule Life, line, quite, might, use a big circle for their e
115 Brief Forms  
116 Rule When word forms end with the diphthong i, the double circle is used to express the diphthong and the termination ly
117 Practice  
118 Rule When vowels follow each other, do the natural thing
119 Rule Any vowel following the diphthong i is expressed by a small circle within the large circle e.g. ‘science’
120 Rule Short i followed by a, as in mania, is expressed by a large circle with a dot placed within it; e followed by the large circle vowel, as in create, is expressed by a large circle with a dash in it. These distinctions are seldom necessary, however:
121 Rule Drop minor vowels
122 Brief Forms  
123 Practice  
124 Abbreviation (Here: 2019-11-15) In the body of a word short u and ow are omitted before n and m, and short u before straight downstrokes.
125 Rule Between n-n, ow is indicated by a jog, as in announce; short u is inserted between n-n, n-m, as in nun and numb; moun is expressed by the men blend, as in mountain.
126 Rule The u is omitted in the termination sume
127 Abbreviation The syllables per, pro, pur, are expressed by pr
127 Abbreviation The syllable ble, by b
127 Abbreviation The syllable ple, by p
127 Abbreviation The syllable ment, by m
128 Rule When pro occurs before an upward character or k, it is more convenient to insert the vowel, as in:
129 Rule Two or more simple prefixes may be joined
130 Brief Forms  
131 Practice  
132 Practice  
133 Letters BLENDED CONSONANTS: nt → a swoop up and right; nd a longer swoop
134 Letters Length of blends
135 Word Drill  
136 Abbreviation The combination ld is expressed by giving l a swinging upward turn at the finish
137 Rule Days and Months
138 Brief Forms  
139 Practice  
140 Letter BLENDS: JENT / PENT; DEF / TIVE: Up horseshoe, down horseshoe
141 Word Drill  
142 Business forms  
143 Brief forms  
144 Practice  
145 Abbreviation The vowel is omitted in the syllables be, de, re, dis, and mis
146 Abbreviation The vowel is retained when de precedes k and g, as in decay and degrade.
147 Abbreviation The vowel in re is omitted only before a downward character, as in replace, repent, review, repair, resign, and reception
148 Rule Phrasing is a thing
149 Rule he phrases was-not and is-not are expressed easily and legibly by using the blending principle:
150 Brief Forms  
151 Practice  
152 Practice  
153 Letter BLENDS: By blending t or d with n or m → ten/den ; tem/dem
154 Word Drill  
155 Rule Don’t use blends when vowel is strong
156 Rule Prefer right motion
157 Rule Phrasing
158 Abbreviation When do-not is preceded by a pronoun, use den
159 Rule don't can be expressed by d-o-n
160 Practice  
161 Abbreviation METHOD OF EXPRESSINAGA ‘R’: A circle or loop is written with the left motion to express r following the vowel.
162 Word Drill  
163 Rule Between a horizontal and an upward stroke the circle is turned with a left motion on the upward stroke to express r following the vowel
164 Rule Before straight lines, s in ser, cer, sar, and th in ther, thir, may be written contrary to the usual method of joining to express r
165 Rule In many words containing ar, er, or, ir, as in the words large, serve, warm, sort, firm, circle, and corner, the r is omitted
166 Word Drill  
167 Abbreviation The termination worthy, as in noteworthy and trustworthy, is expressed by thi; worth, by uth, thus:
168 Abbreviation he syllable ther, as in either and other, is conveniently expressed by the sign for th
169 Practice  
170 Abbreviation for, fore, and fur are expressed by f
170 Abbreviation The suffixes ful and ify are expressed by f
170 Abbreviation Suffix self by s
170 Abbreviation Suffix selves by ses
170 Abbreviation Suffix age by j
171 Rule In phrases, the words ago, early, few, him, hope, sorry, want, sure, and possible are modified
172 Practice  
173 Practice  
174 Rule When slightly enunciated, t is omitted at the end of many words.
175 Drill  
176 Drill  
177 Practice