Fifty-six delegates signed the engrossed copy of the Declaration of Independence.
The signers represented the thirteen colonies that became the original United States. Most historians place the primary signing ceremony on August 2, 1776, although some delegates signed later and the exact sequence of signatures is not completely uniform.
The Declaration had already been adopted by Congress on July 4. Signing the parchment copy was a separate step from approving the text, which explains why the familiar image of all delegates signing on Independence Day can be misleading. John Hancock, president of Congress, has the most famous signature on the document.
The number 56 refers to delegates whose names appear on the engrossed document, not to every person who voted for independence or attended Congress. Some delegates who participated in the independence debate did not sign, while some signers joined Congress after July 4. These details make the signing story more complicated than the popular legend suggests.