The paragraph mark icon is called a Pilcrow and has been around a shockingly long time. In the 1100s, the c was standard. It was eventually stylized with a couple of lines.

Ancient Greeks used to put a horizontal line in the left margin to indicate a new paragraph, then they used the Greek letter gamma, then they just made the first letter in a paragraph extra large.

Finally, it moved to a k for kaput or head eventually transitiong to c for capitulum or little head.