Block quotations
Markdown uses email conventions for quoting blocks of text. A block quotation is one or more paragraphs or other block elements (such as lists or headers), with each line preceded by a > character and a space. (The > need not start at the left margin, but it should not be indented more than three spaces.)
> This is a block quote. This
> paragraph has two lines.
>
> 1. This is a list inside a block quote.
> 2. Second item.
A “lazy” form, which requires the > character only on the first line of each block, is also allowed:
> This is a block quote. This
paragraph has two lines.
> 1. This is a list inside a block quote.
2. Second item.
Among the block elements that can be contained in a block quote are other block quotes. That is, block quotes can be nested:
> This is a block quote.
>
> > A block quote within a block quote.
Standard markdown syntax does not require a blank line before a block quote. Pandoc does require this (except, of course, at the beginning of the document). The reason for the requirement is that it is all too easy for a > to end up at the beginning of a line by accident (perhaps through line wrapping). So, unless --strict is used, the following does not produce a nested block quote in pandoc:
> This is a block quote.
>> Nested.
