Arabic star

The Arabic star is a punctuation mark added to Unicode 1.1[1] because the asterisk (*) might appear similar to a Star of David in its six-lobed form (✻).[2][3]

For astronomical stars with Arabic names, see List of Arabic star names.
٭
Arabic star
U+066D ٭ ARABIC FIVE POINTED STAR

The Arabic star is given a distinct character in Unicode, U+066D ٭ ARABIC FIVE POINTED STAR (the note ‘appearance rather variable’ was added in Unicode 5.1[4]), in the range Arabic punctuation.[5]

Variants

In many modern fonts, however, the asterisk is five-pointed, and the Arabic star is sometimes six- or eight-pointed. The two symbols are compared below (the display depends on your browser's font).

AsteriskFull-width AsteriskArabic starfive-pointed starsix-pointed stareight-pointed star
* ＊ ٭ ★ ✶ ✴

Unicode

In Unicode, Arabic and similar stars are encoded at:

  • U+066D ٭ ARABIC FIVE POINTED STAR
  • U+06DE ۞ ARABIC START OF RUB EL HIZB

In some displays, the use of the ٭ character can cause the text directionality to change.[6]

See also

References
  1. Unicode 1.1 appendix H § 5.4.3: ‘٭’ [066D] arabic five pointed star’
  2. Fonts & Encodings by Yannis Haralambous, page 73: ‘There is nothing inherently Arabic about the character ‘٭’ 0x066D arabic five pointed star; it was provided only to ensure that a five-pointed asterisk would be available, as the ordinary asterisk ‘*’, with its six lobes, might be mistaken for a Star of David in print of poor quality.’
  3. Kenneth Whistler, who was secretary of the Unicode Technical Committee around the time this character was added later wrote: ‘U+066D is a politically motivated addition for Arabic, which always retains its 5-pointed form, so as not to be reminiscent in any way of the Star of David.’
  4. Unicode 5.1 chart Arabic
  5. Chart U+0600 Arabic
  6. Unicode Bidirectional Algorithm


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