A macron is a diacritical mark, a straight bar placed above a letter, usually a vowel. Its name derives from the Greek  (makrón), meaning "long", and was originally used to mark long or heavy syllables in Greco-Roman metrics. It now more often marks a long vowel. In the International Phonetic Alphabet, the macron is used to indicate a mid-tone; the sign for a long vowel is instead a modified triangular colon .