How Braille Works

Braille is a method of reading by touch. Braille letters are made of raised dots (arranged like a domino).

There are 64 permutations of these dots.

Numbers are made by using a numeral sign followed by letters A-J to represent 1-10. 

Braille was devised in 1829 by a Frenchman named Louis Braille.

For speed and to save space English Braille (and a few other languages) ustilises "contractions" that substitute shorter sequences for the full spelling of commonly-occurring letter groups. For example, "the" is usually just one character in English Braille, not only in the definite article but also in words such as "further". However, the same contraction is not used in words such as "sweetheart" because of the way in which certain words are constructed or pronounced. When contractions are used the Braille is usually called "Grade II" in contrast to "Grade I" Braille where every word is spelled out letter-by-letter.

 

Most of the languages we produce use Grade I Braille and because Braille is not an international language, each language has its own official Braille code.