Abbreviations have a long history, created so that spelling out a whole word could be avoided. This might be done to save time and space, and also to provide secrecy. Shortened words were used and initial letters were commonly used to represent words in specific applications. In classical Greece and Rome, the reduction of words to single letters was common.[2] In Roman inscriptions, "Words were commonly abbreviated by using the initial letter or letters of words, and most inscriptions have at least one abbreviation." However, "some could have more than one meaning, depending on their context. (For example, A can be an abbreviation for many words, such as ager, amicus, annus, as, Aulus, Aurelius, aurum and avus.)"[3]

Abbreviations in English were frequently used from its earliest days. Manuscripts of copies of the old English poem Beowulf used many abbreviations, for example 7 or & for and, and y for since, so that "not much space is wasted".[4] The standardisation of English in the 15th through 17th centuries included such a growth in the use of abbreviations.[5][citation needed] At first, abbreviations were sometimes represented with various suspension signs, not only periods. For example, sequences like ‹er› were replaced with ‹ɔ›, as in ‹mastɔ› for master and ‹exacɔbate› for exacerbate. While this may seem trivial, it was symptomatic of an attempt by people manually reproducing academic texts to reduce the copy time. An example from the Oxford University Register, 1503:[citation needed]