What is "small caps"

capital \cap"i*tal\ (k[a^]p"[i^]*tal), n. [Cf. L. capitellum and capitulum, a small head, the head, top, or capital of a column, dim. of caput head; F. chapiteau, OF. capitel. See chief, and cf. cattle, chattel, chapiter, chapter.]

1. (Arch.) The head or uppermost member of a column, pilaster, etc. It consists generally of three parts, abacus, bell (or vase), and necking. See these terms, and Column.

2. [Cf. F. capilate, fem., sc. ville.] (Geog.) The seat of government; the chief city or town in a country; a metropolis. ``A busy and splendid capital''
   --Macauly.

3. [Cf. F. capital.] Money, property, or stock employed in trade, manufactures, etc.; the sum invested or lent, as distinguished from the income or interest. See Capital stock, under Capital, a.

4. (Polit. Econ.) That portion of the produce of industry, which may be directly employed either to support human beings or to assist in production.
   --M'Culloch.

   Note: When wealth is used to assist production it is called capital. The capital of a civilized community includes fixed capital (i.e. buildings, machines, and roads used in the course of production and exchange) and circulating capital (i.e., food, fuel, money, etc., spent in the course of production and exchange).
   --T. Raleigh.

5. Anything which can be used to increase one's power or influence.

   He tried to make capital out of his rival's discomfiture.
   --London Times.

6. (Fort.) An imaginary line dividing a bastion, ravelin, or other work, into two equal parts.

7. A chapter, or section, of a book. [Obs.]

   Holy St. Bernard hath said in the 59th capital.
   --Sir W. Scott.

8. (Print.) See Capital letter, under Capital, a.

   Active capital. See under Active,

   Small capital (Print.), a small capital letter; informally referred to (in the plural) as small caps; as, the technical terms are listed in small caps. See under Capital, a.

   To live on one's capital, to consume one's capital without producing or accumulating anything to replace it.

n. (context typography English) Capital letters A, B, C, ... shown in the same form but in small size (typically of the same size as lower-case letters).

In typography, small capitals (usually abbreviated small caps) are uppercase (capital) characters set at the same height and weight as surrounding lowercase (small) letters or text figures. They are used in running text to prevent capitalized words from appearing too large on the page, and as a method of emphasis or distinctiveness for text alongside or instead of italics, or when boldface is inappropriate. For example, the all-caps TEXT IN CAPS appears as in small caps. They can be used to draw attention to the opening phrase or line of a new section of text, or to provide an additional style in a dictionary entry where many parts must be typographically differentiated.

Well-designed small capitals are not simply scaled-down versions of normal capitals; they normally retain the same stroke weight as other letters and have a wider aspect ratio for readability.

Typically, the height of a small capital will be one ex, the same height as most lowercase characters in the font. In Anglo-Saxon typography, small caps are somewhat larger than the x-height. For example, in some Tiro Typeworks fonts, small caps are 30% larger than x-height, and 70% the height of full capitals. To differentiate between these two alternatives, the x-height form is sometimes called petite caps, preserving the name "small caps" for the larger variant. OpenType fonts can define both forms via the "small caps" and the "petite caps" features. Because the support for the petite caps feature is absent from most desktop-publishing programs, many fonts use x-height small caps in the small-caps feature.

Many word processors and text-formatting systems include an option to format text in caps and small caps, which leaves uppercase letters as they are, but converts lowercase letters to small caps. How this is implemented depends on the typesetting system; some can use true small caps associated with modern professional fonts, making text such as "Latvia joined on March 29, 2004" look proportional; but less complex digital fonts do not have a small-caps case, so the typesetting system simply reduces the uppercase letters by a fraction, making them look out of proportion. A work-around to simulate real small capitals is to use a one-level bolder version of the small caps generated by such systems, to match well with the normal weights of capitals and lowercase, especially when such small caps are extended about 5% or letterspaced a half point or a point.