Syntax

HTML	E F { sRules }
Scripting	N/A

Possible Values

E	String that specifies the name of a document language element type or simple selector.
F	String that specifies the name of a document language element type or simple selector.
sRules	String that specifies one or more Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) attribute/value pairs.

Remarks

A descendant combinator is white space that separates two simple selectors. A selector of the form "E F" matches element F when it is an arbitrary descendant of some ancestor element E.

Note   Descendant combinators were called contextual selectors in Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), Level 1 (CSS1).

To skip over a generation of elements and pass styles to descendants beyond child elements, combine the Universal (*) Selector with the Descendant Combinator. For example, the following selector matches any P elements that are not direct descendants (grandchildren or later) of a DIV element.

DIV * P {}

Example

The following style rule applies only to LI elements within a DIV with a class of menu. Note that the selected elements do not have to be a direct descendant of the DIV tag.

<style>
    DIV.menu LI { font-size: x-small; }
</style>

Standards Information

This selector is defined in CSS, Level 2 (CSS2).

See Also

Adjacent Sibling (+) Combinator, Child (>) Combinator, General Sibling (~) Combinator