Chicago Citation Guide, Author-Date and NB, 17E: Captions

• An explanation of captions can be found starting at 3.21 (p.136+) in the CMOS 17E. Or look online.

• Captions should be capitalized using sentence case.

• Captions appear outside, and usually below, the illustration.

• Titles for paintings, drawings, photographs, statues, and books will be italicized and in title case.

• Titles of articles, essays, and short poems are not in italics, but will be in quotation marks.

• Commit to either full sentences with appropriate punctuation in the caption or incomplete sentences with no closing punctuation.

• Illustration numbers (e.g., Figure 3, Plate 1) should be followed by a period, a space, then the caption.

• If the text of your caption runs long, it should be single spaced.

Figure 3. Life of Chinese Emperors, Qing period