What does the ampersand indicate in this bash command 1>&2

Question

Quick one, 2>&1 redirects stderr to stdout, but what does the ampersand mean? I know if we had 2 > 1 it would output to a file named

Answer 1

From info bash:

3.6.7 Duplicating File Descriptors
----------------------------------

The redirection operator
     [N]<&WORD
   is used to duplicate input file descriptors.  If WORD expands to one
or more digits, the file descriptor denoted by N is made to be a copy
of that file descriptor.  If the digits in WORD do not specify a file
descriptor open for input, a redirection error occurs.  If WORD
evaluates to `-', file descriptor N is closed.  If N is not specified,
the standard input (file descriptor 0) is used.

   The operator
     [N]>&WORD
   is used similarly to duplicate output file descriptors.  If N is not
specified, the standard output (file descriptor 1) is used.  If the
digits in WORD do not specify a file descriptor open for output, a
redirection error occurs.  As a special case, if N is omitted, and WORD
does not expand to one or more digits, the standard output and standard
error are redirected as described previously.

So 2>&1 duplicates fd 1 onto fd 2.