Whenever you set the Region, whether with C-SPC (set-mark-command) or a mouse selection, or implicitly with textual
object mark commands (like M-h (mark-paragraph)), the Mark’s current location is pushed onto the Mark Ring. The Mark is
also set for you automatically at places where you’ve done “significant” things, like changing text, moving a long way
away in one big jump (there being many ways to do this), the spot where you issued a search command, and the like, and
these locations also go onto the Mark Ring.
Thus a breadcrumb trail of Marks is left for you to find your way back, Theseus-like, to where you’ve been, and provides
a quick way to get back to these previous locations. The way to jump back to the previous Mark location is to give C-SPC
(set-mark-command) an argument, so C-u C-SPC. It also rotates the Mark Ring, so that a repeated, uninterrupted sequence
of C-u C-SPC commands will take you back in time through your previous Mark locations. The Mark Ring is a circular
structure, so when you hit the end, you’ll circle round to the most recent Mark location again. You’ll notice the
analogies to the operation of the Kill Ring.
@devinprater
Also, if you are at a spot you think you'll want to come back to later, but you don't want to mark a region, you can just hit C-SPC twice. That sets the mark and immediately deactivates it, but still adds the spot to the mark ring.
@devinprater Thank you! I didn’t know about C-u C-spc. I have occasionally been frustrated that I had overridden a previous mark, but not frustrated enough to research how to use them properly.
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