First instance of @ (at sign)

According to history professor Giorgio Stabile from La Sapienza University of Rome, Italy, the first documented and credible appearance of the @ (at) sign dates from 4 May 1536, when an Italian merchant, Francesco Lapi, noted in writing the arrival of treasures delivered by Spanish conquistadors from their conquest of Peru and used the symbol to refer to amphorae, a unit of measurement. Despite having no agreed name in the English language, @ is now a part of everyday life as a shorthand for "at" and as the delimiter in email addresses. Earlier appearances of @ can, arguably, be found on medieval manuscripts, where it might have been used as shorthand by tired scribes, although Lapi's use is the first known use of the symbol as a character in its own right with a distinct meaning. An "amphora" is a vessel for wine, but the term was also used to indicate a container's volume and became a unit of measurement. The @ evolved to become a shorthand for "at", and finally appeared on typewriter keyboards in the 1880s. The first use of the @ character can be dated to 1971 and the sending of the first email.