A signature (; from la, signare, "to sign") is a
handwritten
Handwriting is the writing done with a writing instrument, such as a pen or pencil, in the hand. Handwriting includes both printing and cursive styles and is separate from formal calligraphy or typeface. Because each person's handwriting is u ...
(and often
stylized) depiction of someone's name, nickname, or even a simple "X" or other mark that a person writes on documents as a proof of identity and intent. The writer of a signature is a signatory or signer. Similar to a handwritten signature, a signature work describes the work as readily identifying its creator. A signature may be confused with an
autograph, which is chiefly an artistic signature. This can lead to confusion when people have both an autograph and signature and as such some people in the public eye keep their signatures private whilst fully publishing their autograph.
Function and types
The traditional function of a signature is to permanently affix to a document a person's uniquely personal, undeniable self-identification as physical evidence of that person's personal witness and certification of the content of all, or a specified part, of the document. For example, the role of a signature in many consumer contracts is not solely to provide evidence of the identity of the contracting party, but also to provide evidence of deliberation and informed consent. In many countries, signatures may be witnessed and recorded in the presence of a
notary public to carry additional legal force. In some jurisdictions, an illiterate signatory can make a "mark" (often an "X" but occasionally a personalized symbol) on legal documents, so long as the document is countersigned by a literate witness. In some countries, illiterate people place a thumbprint on legal documents in lieu of a written signature.
In the United States, signatures encompass marks and actions of all sorts that are indicative of identity and intent. The legal rule is that unless a statute specifically prescribes a particular method of making a signature it may be made in any number of ways. These include by a mechanical or rubber stamp facsimile. A signature may be made by the purported signatory; alternatively someone else duly authorized by the signatory, acting in the signer's presence and at the signatory's direction, may make the signature.
Many individuals have much more fanciful signatures than their normal
cursive
Cursive (also known as script, among other names) is any style of penmanship in which characters are written joined in a flowing manner, generally for the purpose of making writing faster, in contrast to block letters. It varies in functionalit ...
writing, including elaborate
ascenders,
descenders and exotic
flourishes, much as one would find in
calligraphic writing. As an example, the final "k" in
John Hancock's famous signature on the US Declaration of Independence loops back to underline his name. This kind of flourish is also known as a ''
paraph
Paraph may refer to:
* Paraph, a flourish at the end of a signature
* Paraph, an alternative name for the pilcrow sign ¶
*''Paraphs'', a 1928 book by Hermann Püterschein illustrated by William Addison Dwiggins
See also
*
*Paragraph
A paragraph ...
'', a
French
French (french: français(e), link=no) may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to France
** French language, which originated in France, and its various dialects and accents
** French people, a nation and ethnic group identified with Franc ...
term meaning flourish, initial or signature. The paraph is used in
graphology
Graphology is the analysis of handwriting with attempt to determine someone's personality traits. No scientific evidence exists to support graphology, and it is generally considered a pseudoscience or scientifically questionable practice. Howe ...
analyses.
Several cultures whose languages use writing systems other than alphabets do not share the Western notion of signatures per se: the "signing" of one's name results in a written product no different from the result of "writing" one's name in the standard way. For these languages, to write or to sign involves the same written characters. Also see
Calligraphy
Calligraphy (from el, link=y, καλλιγραφία) is a visual art related to writing. It is the design and execution of lettering with a pen, ink brush, or other writing instrument. Contemporary calligraphic practice can be defined as "t ...
.
Mechanically produced signatures
Special signature machines, called
autopens, are capable of automatically reproducing an individual's signature. These are typically used by people required to sign a lot of printed matter, such as celebrities, heads of state or CEOs. More recently,
Members of Congress in the United States have begun having their signature made into a
TrueType font file. This allows staff members in the Congressman's office to easily reproduce it on correspondence, legislation, and official documents. In the East Asian languages of
Chinese
Chinese can refer to:
* Something related to China
* Chinese people, people of Chinese nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity
**''Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic concept of the Chinese nation
** List of ethnic groups in China, people of va ...
,
Japanese, and
Korean, people traditionally use stamp-like objects known as ''name-
seals'' with the name carved in ''tensho'' script (''
seal script'') in lieu of a handwritten signature.
Wet signatures
A wet signature is a person's name written in their own hand with ink. Some government agencies require that professional persons or official reviewers sign originals and all copies of originals to authenticate that they personally viewed the content. In the United States this is prevalent with architectural and construction plans. Its intent is to prevent mistakes or fraud but the practice is not known to be effective.
Detection of forged signatures
Handwriting experts say "it is extremely difficult for anyone to be able to figure out if a signature or other very limited writing sample has been forged."
High volume review of signatures, to decide if a signature is true or forged, occurs when election offices decide whether to accept
absentee ballot
An absentee ballot is a vote cast by someone who is unable or unwilling to attend the official polling station to which the voter is normally allocated. Methods include voting at a different location, postal voting, proxy voting and online votin ...
s arriving from voters,
and possibly when banks decide whether to pay
checks
Check or cheque, may refer to:
Places
* Check, Virginia
Arts, entertainment, and media
* ''Check'' (film), a 2021 Indian Telugu-language film
* ''The Checks'' (episode), a 1996 TV episode of ''Seinfeld''
Games and sports
* Check (chess), a thr ...
.
The highest error rates in signature verification are found with lay people, higher than for computers, which in turn make more errors than experts.
There have been concerns that signature reviews improperly reject ballots from young and minority voters at higher rates than others, with no or limited ability of voters to appeal the rejection.
When errors are made with bank checks, the payer can ask the bank for corrections.
A fifth of adults in the United Kingdom say they sign so rarely they have no consistent signature, including 21% of people 18-24 and 16% of people over age 55. 55% of UK adults rarely sign anything.
Researchers have published error rates for computerized signature verification. They compare different systems on a common database of true and false signatures. The best system falsely rejects 10% of true signatures, while it accepts 10% of forgeries. Another system has error rates on both of 14%, and the third-best has error rates of 17%.
[These systems handle scanned ("offline") signatures from multiple people ("WI, writer-independent"). ] It is possible to be less stringent and reject fewer true signatures, at the cost of also rejecting fewer forgeries.
Computer algorithms:
look for a certain number of points of similarity between the compared signatures ... a wide range of algorithms and standards, each particular to that machine's manufacturer, are used to verify signatures. In addition, counties have discretion in managing the settings and implementing manufacturers' guidelines ... there are no statewide standards for automatic signature verification ... most counties do not have a publicly available, written explanation of the signature verification criteria and processes they use.
In an experiment, experts rejected 5% of true signatures and 71% of forgeries. They were doubtful about another 57% of true signatures and 27% of forgeries. If computer verification is adjusted to reflect what experts are sure about, it will wrongly reject 5% of true signatures and wrongly accept 29% of forgeries. If computers were adjusted more strictly, rejecting all signatures which experts have doubts about, the computers would set aside 62% of true signatures, and still wrongly accept 2% of forgeries. Lay people made more mistakes and were doubtful less often, though the study does not report whether their mistakes were to accept more forgeries or reject more true signatures.
Voters with short names are at a disadvantage, since experts make more mistakes on signatures with fewer "turning points and intersections." Participants in this study had 10 true signatures to compare to, which is more than most postal ballot verifications have.
A more recent study for the US Department of Justice confirms the probabilistic nature of signature verification, though it does not provide numbers.
Online usage
In
e-mail and
newsgroup usage, another type of signature exists which is independent of one's language. Users can set one or more lines of custom text known as a
signature block
A signature block (often abbreviated as signature, sig block, sig file, .sig, dot sig, siggy, or just sig) is a personalized block of text automatically appended at the bottom of an email message, Usenet article, or forum post.
Email and Usenet
...
to be automatically appended to their messages. This text usually includes a name, contact information, and sometimes quotations and
ASCII art
ASCII art is a graphic design technique that uses computers for presentation and consists of pictures pieced together from the 95 printable (from a total of 128) characters defined by the ASCII Standard from 1963 and ASCII compliant chara ...
. A shortened form of a signature block, only including one's name, often with some distinguishing prefix, can be used to simply indicate the end of a
post or response. Some web sites also allow graphics to be used. Note, however, that this type of signature is not related to
electronic signatures or
digital signature
A digital signature is a mathematical scheme for verifying the authenticity of digital messages or documents. A valid digital signature, where the prerequisites are satisfied, gives a recipient very high confidence that the message was created b ...
s, which are more technical in nature and not directly understandable by humans.
Art
![Vermeer autograph](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/23/Vermeer_autograph.svg)
The signature on a painting or other work of art has always been an important item in the assessment of art. Fake signatures are sometimes added to enhance the value of a painting, or are added to a fake painting to support its authenticity. A notorious case was the signature of
Johannes Vermeer on the fake "Supper at Emmaus" made by the art-forger
Han van Meegeren. However, the fact that painters' signatures often vary over time (particularly in the modern and contemporary periods) might complicate the issue. The signatures of some painters take on an artistic form that may be of less value in determining forgeries.
If a painting is
abstract or
ambiguous
Ambiguity is the type of meaning (linguistics), meaning in which a phrase, statement or resolution is not explicitly defined, making several interpretations wikt:plausible#Adjective, plausible. A common aspect of ambiguity is uncertainty. It ...
, the signature can be the only clue to determine which side is the top.
Copyright
Under British law, the appearance of signatures (not the names themselves) may be protected under
copyright law.
Under
United States copyright law, "titles, names
c... mere variations of typographic ornamentation, lettering, or coloring" are not eligible for copyright;
[Copyright Basics]
", United States Copyright Office
The United States Copyright Office (USCO), a part of the Library of Congress, is a United States government body that maintains records of copyright registration, including a copyright catalog. It is used by copyright title searchers who are ...
. Retrieved 15 March 2011. however, the appearance of signatures (not the names themselves) may be protected under copyright law.
Uniform Commercial Code
Uniform Commercial Code §1-201(37) of the United States generally defines signed as "using any symbol executed or adopted with present intention to adopt or accept a writing." The Uniform Commercial Code §3-401(b) for
negotiable instruments
A negotiable instrument is a document guaranteeing the payment of a specific amount of money, either on demand, or at a set time, whose payer is usually named on the document. More specifically, it is a document contemplated by or consisting of a ...
states "A signature may be made (i) manually or by means of a device or machine, and (ii) by the use of any name, including a
trade or assumed name, or by a word, mark, or symbol executed or adopted by a person with present intention to authenticate a writing."
See also
*
Autograph club
Autograph collecting is the practice of collecting autographs of famous persons. Some of the most popular categories of autograph subjects are president (government title), presidents, military soldiers, athletes, movie stars, artists, social ...
*''
Autograph Collector Magazine''
*
Biometric signature as form of the
electronic signature
*
Builder's signature
A builder's signature, sometimes known as a craftsman's signature, tradesman's signature, or workman's signature, is a type of signature associated with several skilled trades in which a tradesperson inscribes their name on a structure during or a ...
*
Initials
*
Images of signatures
An image is a visual representation of something. It can be two-dimensional, three-dimensional, or somehow otherwise feed into the visual system to convey information. An image can be an artifact, such as a photograph or other two-dimensiona ...
*''
manu propria
' (Latin for ' ignedwith one's own hand'), abbreviated to ''m.p.'' or ''mppr.'' or ''mppria'' is a phrase sometimes used at the end of typewritten or printed documents when there is no handwritten signature. It is typically found just after t ...
'' (''m.p.'')
*
Memorial to the 56 Signers of the Declaration of Independence, includes depicted signatures
*
Monogram
A monogram is a motif made by overlapping or combining two or more letters or other graphemes to form one symbol. Monograms are often made by combining the initials of an individual or a company, used as recognizable symbols or logos. A series o ...
*
Round-robin (document), a signed document where the signatures are arranged in a circle
*
Royal sign-manual
*
Shakespeare's handwriting
*
Signum manus
*
Tughra
*
Huaya
A ''huaya'' ("Flower Print"; ; ko, 화압, Hwaap; ja, 花押, Kaō) is a stylized signature or mark used in East Asian cultures in place of a true signature. Originating from China, the ''huaya'' was historically used by prominent figures such ...
References
External links
Why Do We Sign For Things? A Rabbi, A Lawyer And A MasterCard Exec ExplainNPR / Planet Money
at ''Slate''
What is Signature? Signature of 100 famous people
{{Authority control
Authentication methods
Identity documents
Writing
Biometrics
Articles containing self-references
Personal identification
Names