Serif

A short stroke or fine line finishing off the main strokes of a letter, whether hand drawn or of type, as at the start and finish of the S's (as well as at the upper-left of the lower-case h) in the title of this page. Such strokes are characteristic of Roman letters. Common fonts which have serifs are Bookman, Caslon, New York, Palatino, and Times. Letters having no serif are called sans serif. Also see capital letters, lowercase, and typography.