Notae

Notae is a Latin term meaning notes, marks, or annotations. In classical Latin, nota (plural notae) refers to a mark or sign and by extension to notes made in writing. The form notae is the nominative plural and the genitive singular of nota, depending on grammatical context.

In manuscript culture, notae denotes marginalia or glosses added by readers or scribes to clarify, comment on, or correct the main text. Such notae can range from simple clarifications to extensive scholia, and they are often valuable to textual criticism for understanding interpretive traditions and transmission.

In philology and linguistics, the concept of notae is used to describe annotations, editorial marks, or explanatory notes accompanying texts, as well as annotations in language data. Notae can help scholars track linguistic features, editorial decisions, or interpretive variants across manuscript traditions or editions.

Notae may appear in scholarly Latin phrases or as a Latinized label in academic contexts. They are generally distinct from the main text, serving an auxiliary function. The term is occasionally encountered in catalogues, editions, or studies that discuss marginal commentary, annotations, or editorial apparatus.

The related phrases include nota bene (NB), marginalia, gloss, and annotation. While notae is primarily a Latin word, modern writers may use the form in academic titles or to evoke historical or philological methods. Notae is not a single, fixed modern term with a precise technical definition beyond its general sense of notes or marginalia; its exact meaning depends on the textual tradition and scholarly field.