The Grammar of reStructuredText

Inline Markup

  • one asterisk: text for emphasis (italics)
  • two asterisks: text for strong emphasis (boldface)
  • backquotes: text for code samples

Lists and Quote-like Blocks

  • This is a bulleted list.
  • It has two items, the second item uses two lines.
  1. This is a numbered list.
  2. It has two items too.
  3. This is a numbered list.
  4. It has two items too.
  • this is
  • a list
    • with a nested list
    • and some subitems
  • and here the parent list continues
term (up to a line of text)

Definition of the term, which must be indented

and can even consist of multiple paragraphs

next term
Description.
These lines are
broken exactly like in
the source file.

Source Code

This is a normal text paragraph. The next paragraph is a code sample:

It is not processed in any way, except
that the indentation is removed.

It can span multiple lines.

This is a normal text paragraph again.

Tables

Header row, column 1 (header rows optional) Header 2 Header 3 Header 4
body row 1, column 1 column 2 column 3 column 4
body row 2 ... ...  

Sections

  • # with overline, for parts
  • * with overline, for chapters
  • =, for sections
  • -, for subsections
  • ^, for subsubsections
  • “, for paragraphs”

More infomation see http://www.sphinx-doc.org/en/1.4.8/rest.html#rst-primer.