Key:inscription

The key inscription=* is used for the text of inscriptions on buildings, memorials, advertising signs, and other objects.

How to map

Inscription represents text physically found on the feature in the real world.

| or the spaced slash / may be used to represent  line breaks and || or the spaced double slash // to  paragraph breaks depending on the style guide preferred.

iD editor uses the escape sequence \n for line breaks and \n\n for paragraph breaks, which might be preferred because real objects can contain the pipe | or slash /characters.

Limited length

As for all values, there is a limit of 255 characters for the value of inscription=*

Referencing other data services

To overcome the length limit, the inscription might be added to:

• wikidata=* - If this feature has a Wikidata item, it can be described there using inscription (Property:P1684), as the character limit is set at 1,500.
• openplaques:id=<ID number> - If it is a commemorative/historical plaque, you can also add the full inscription to openplaques.org and then link the entry with the OSM object.
• inscription:url=* - URL where the inscription can be found on an external website; e.g. Wikisource (useful when the inscription is longer than the above limit).

Splitting across multiple keys

Some mappers overcome the limit by splitting the value across multiple keys, e.g.

• inscription:1=Beginning of very long text....
• inscription:2=...the end!

Related tags

• description=* - Additional information about an element, containing text not existent in real world.
• man_made=geoglyph
• Proposal:Epigraph, a proposal to map epigraphs (inscriptions) on their own (particularly useful to locate inscriptions on bigger objects and where there are several of them).

Possible tagging mistakes

memorial:text=*

More details at taginfo

• memorial:text=*

If you know places with this tag, verify if it could be tagged with another tag.
Automated edits are strongly discouraged unless you really know what you are doing!