the Latin alphabet, which are fé (ᚠ 'cattle, goods') and maðr (ᛘ 'man'). divides abbreviations into six overlapping categories: by suspension () by contraction () with independent meaning () with relative meaning () by superscript letters () by convention () Suspension Suspended terms are those of which only the first part is written, and the last part is substituted by a mark, which can be of two types: General indicating there has been an abbreviation but not how. The marks are placed above or across the ascender of the letters. The final three of the series are knot-like and are used in papal or regal documents. Specific indicating that a truncation has occurred. The third case is a stylistic alternative found in several fonts, here Andron (Unicode chart extended D). The largest class of suspensions consists of single letters standing in for words that begin with that letter. A dot at the baseline after a capital letter may stand for a title if it is used such as in front of names or a person's name in medieval legal documents. However, not all sigla use the beginning of the word. For plural words, the siglum is often doubled: F. = and FF. = . Tripled sigla often stand for three: DDD = . Letters lying on their sides, or mirrored (backwards), often indicate female titles, but a mirrored C (Ↄ) stands generally for or (the latter sometimes with a macron above: Ↄ̄). To avoid confusion with abbreviations and numerals, the latter are often written with a bar above. In some contexts, however, numbers with a line above indicate that number is to be multiplied by a thousand, and several other abbreviations also have a line above them, such as (Greek letters chi + rho) = or = Jesus. Starting in the 8th or the 9th century, single-letter sigla grew less common and were replaced by longer, less ambiguous sigla with bars above them. Contraction Abbreviations by contraction have one or more middle letters omitted. They were often represented with a general mark of abbreviation (above), such as a line above. They can be divided into two subtypes: pure keeps only the first (one or more) and last (one or more) letters but not intermediate letters. Special cases arise when a contraction keeps only the first and last letter of a word, resulting in a two-letter sigla mixed (impure) keeps one