till or 'til

Which is correct as the short form of until. 'til seems to make more sense because it's short for ''until'' not ''untill''.

When I have occasion to use it in writing, I use 'til.

in another forum, there was a question about apostrophes. one person said that an apostrophe is only supposed to be used in the place of one letter, such as in don't for do not or rock 'n' roll. following those rules, 'til would be wrong because the apostrophe would be taking the place of both the "u" and the "n". However, as stated above, there aren't two "l"s in "until". When I write, I usually write "till". But that's a very interesting question.

The accepted written forms are "until" and "till"; " 'til " should not be used when writing. You can check http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=till*1+0&dict=A


Best regards,
Caesar

Apparently till is actually older than until, which was formed later by having the prefix un– stuck onto it. Then there was that 18th century rage for messing about with English and 'till came into fashion along with feathery hats and tight trousers (oo-er). So all told, 'til *should* be correct and till shouldn't be. It's a funny old world, eh?

Thanks to www.bartleby.com for enlightening me. They even provides a pronunciation thing that speaks (shouts?) when clicked. Good for waking up snoozing students.

Chilli, I think that you misunderstood the entry that you read at http://www.bartleby.com. I check the word "till" and the usage note says the following:

Till and until are generally interchangeable in both writing and speech, though as the first word in a sentence until is usually preferred: Until you get that paper written, don't even think about going to the movies. •Till is actually the older word, with until having been formed by the addition to it of the prefix un–, meaning “up to.” In the 18th century the spelling 'till became fashionable, as if till were a shortened form of until. Although 'till is now nonstandard, 'til is sometimes used in this way and is considered acceptable, though it is etymologically incorrect.

The address where you can check the entry "till" is this one: http://www.bartleby.com/61/43/T0214300.html

You can check the entry "til" here: http://www.bartleby.com/61/32/T0213250.html, but it refers to the usage note mentioned above.

The fact that " 'til " is considered acceptable does not mean that it is ethymologically correct. This means that till *should* be correct and 'til should not.


Best regards,
Caesar.

... but perhaps Chilli was correct on the important point about the feathery hats and tight trousers.

My apologies. After ten o'clock I have the comprehension skills of a gnat.

A small one.