Nota

Nota is a term found in several languages with roots in Latin, where nota means mark or sign. In general, nota denotes a note, remark, or short piece of information, and it is used in everyday writing, scholarly work, and various professional contexts to indicate an annotation or comment. The word has spread across Romance languages in forms such as Italian nota, Spanish nota, and Portuguese nota, often retaining senses related to note, remark, or grade. In Romanian, a similar term notă refers to a note or a grade, showing the same lineage with a diacritic variation.

In music, nota refers specifically to a musical note—the basic unit of pitch or duration in standard notation. In this sense, notes are the building blocks of melodies and rhythms, and the term appears across instructional and theoretical texts in Romance-language traditions.

Beyond language and music, nota appears in phrases and practical uses. The Latin phrase nota bene, often abbreviated NB, signals the importance of a remark to be noted. In some languages, nota also denotes documents such as receipts, invoices, or banknotes; for example, in Indonesian and Malay, nota commonly means a note or receipt, while in Portuguese it can refer to a banknote or a piece of currency.

Overall, nota is a versatile term tied to the idea of marking, recording, or informing, with varied but related meanings across languages and disciplines. See also note, notation, and footnote.