initials

1. 1
   nounplural

   A short form of a person's name made from the first letters of their first, last, and sometimes middle names.

   The lawyer asked me to add my initials beside each correction.

   Monogrammed towels often display the owner's initials in elegant stitching.

   Note

   A noun used only in the plural, even though one person's initials work as a single unit. It takes plural agreement: your initials are smudged; write them here. Nobody says "an initials." To talk about just one of the letters, use the singular initial. When initials are stitched or engraved as a design, the result is a monogram, which is why monogrammed linen carries the owner's initials.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of initial.

   The illuminated initials in the medieval text were decorated with gold leaf.

   Printers once used ornate initials to mark the beginning of each chapter.

   Note

   One plural spelling serves several different nouns. A printer's initials are the enlarged letters that open chapters or sections. A phonologist's are syllable onsets, the sounds that come before the nucleus. In everyday writing they are simply the first letters of words. When the letters stand for someone's name, the word behaves differently and is used only in the plural; see the name sense.

3. 3
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of initial.

   The manager initials each invoice once she has checked the figures.

   Whenever a correction is made, the supervisor initials the margin.

   Note

   The verb looks exactly like the plural noun, so context has to tell them apart. Compare "the clerk initials the form" with "the clerk's initials are on the form." The verb is transitive, and its object is the document or change being approved: she initials each invoice, or he initials the margin. It works as a shortened signature, used for routine approval where a full signature would be unnecessary.

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