# How to get eth and thorn symbols in Plain tex

Is it possible to create control sequences in plain Tex to produce the (phonetic) symbols for eth and thorn, e.g., as used in the compacted spin-coefficient formalism?

• Welcome to TeX.SE! – Mico Jun 30 at 1:27
• Do you want them upright or italic? Are they to be used in math mode? – egreg Jun 30 at 10:18

## 2 Answers

You can use the wasysym fonts.

\font\wasy=wasy10 at 10pt
\def\thorn{{\wasy\char105}}
\def\eth{{\wasy\char107}}

\thorn
\eth

\bye


If you use the standard Computer Modern fonts, you can take the symbols from the companion EC fonts.

\font\teniOne=ecti1000
\font\seveniOne=ecti0900
\font\fiveiOne=ecti0500

\newfam\tOne
\textfont\tOne=\teniOne
\scriptfont\tOne=\seveniOne
\scriptscriptfont\tOne=\fiveiOne

\def\definetOnesymbol#1#2{%
% use the following two lines for Knuth TeX
%  \count255=\tOne \multiply\count255 by 256 \advance\count255 by #2
%  \mathchardef#1=\count255
% it's simpler with e-TeX enabled, which is the case for pdftex
\mathchardef#1=\numexpr\tOne*256+#2\relax
}
\definetOnesymbol{\meth}{"F0}
\definetOnesymbol{\mthorn}{"FE}

$\meth f+\mthorn f$

\bye