Definition of "virgil"
virgil
noun
plural virgils
(typography, UK, archaic) Synonym of slash ⟨/⟩.
Quotations
There be five manner of points and divisions most used among cunning men; the which if they be well used, make the sentence very light and easy to be understood, both to the reader and hearer: and they be these, virgil,—come,—parenthesis,—plain point,—interrogative... it is a slender stroke leaning forward, betokening a little short rest, without any perfectness yet of sentence.
1824, J. Johnson, Typographia
Whoever introduced the several points, it seems that a full-point, a point called come, answering to our colon-point, a point called virgil answering to our comma-point, the parenthesis-points and interrogative-point, were used at the close of the fourteenth, or beginning of the fifteenth century.
1842, F. Francillon, An Essay on Punctuation, page 9