Braille

[breyl] /breɪl/

noun

Louis

[loo-is,, loo-ee;; French lwee] /ˈlu ɪs,, ˈlu i;; French lwi/ (Show IPA), 1809–52, French teacher of the blind.

a system of writing or printing, devised by L. Braille for use by the blind, in which combinations of tangible dots or points are used to represent letters, characters, etc., that are read by touch.

verb (used with object), Brailled, Brailling.

to write or transliterate in Braille characters.

Also, braille (for defs 2, 3).

Origin

1850-55

British Dictionary definitions for Braille

Braille¹

/breɪl/

noun

a system of writing for the blind consisting of raised dots that can be interpreted by touch, each dot or group of dots representing a letter, numeral, or punctuation mark

any writing produced by this method Compare Moon

verb

(transitive) to print or write using this method

Braille²

/French braj/

noun

Louis (lwi). 1809–52, French inventor, musician, and teacher of the blind, who himself was blind from the age of three and who devised the Braille system of raised writing

Word Origin and History for Braille

1853, from Louis Braille (1809-1852), French musician and teacher, blind from age 3, who devised it c.1830.

Braille in Culture

Braille definition

A system of writing and printing for the blind in which arrangements of raised dots representing letters and numbers can be identified by touch.

Braille in Technology

human language
/breyl/ (Often capitalised) A class of writing systems, intended for use by blind and low-vision users, which express glyphs as raised dots. Currently employed braille standards use eight dots per cell, where a cell is a glyph-space two dots across by four dots high; most glyphs use only the top six dots.
Braille was developed by Louis Braille (pronounced /looy bray/) in France in the 1820s. Braille systems for most languages can be fairly trivially converted to and from the usual script.
Braille has several totally coincidental parallels with digital computing: it is binary, it is based on groups of eight bits/dots and its development began in the 1820s, at the same time Charles Babbage proposed the Difference Engine.
Computers output Braille on braille displays and braille printers for hard copy.
British Royal National Institute for the Blind (https://rnib.org.uk/wesupply/fctsheet/braille.htm).
(1998-10-19)