Latin Words, Phrases, and Abbreviations Commonly Used in Footnotes

Footnotes help you better understand the subject matter you are reading about. They contain further information, explanatory notes, and bibliographic references. Often you will notice special words and phrases, mostly abbreviated and in Latin. These Latin abbreviations are keys to understanding the notes as well as finding your way about the bibliographic information.

Here is a list of some of the most common Latin words and phrases (and their abbreviations, where applicable) commonly used in footnotes.

ante: This is a Latin preposition/adverb that simply means "before" (in this case, earlier in a book, section, or chapter). You are no stranger to ante: you use it every time you say a.m. (= ante meridiem; literally "before noon")

cf.: This is a widely used abbreviation of the Latin verb form confer, which is the second-person singular imperative of the active present tense of the verb confero (= I compare).

et seq. (sometimes plain seq.): Abbreviation of the phrase et sequens, which means "and the following" (e.g. the following citation). If the following are several, then you will see the Latin phrase in the plural, et sequentes, or its corresponding abbreviation et seqq.

ff.: This is a reduplicated abbreviation of foliis (< Latin folium, a leaf). It means "on (the following) pages".

ibidem: You will find this abbreviated to ibid. or ib. Ibidem is a Latin adverb that means "in the same place", "in that very place". When you see it in a bibliographic note, just look for the "place" (i.e. the book, article, etc. that is the source of the citation) in the previous footnote.

loco citato (abbreviated to loc. cit.): The phrase means "in the place cited", i.e. in the passage already quoted.

opere citato (abbreviated to op. cit.): The phrase means "in the work cited", i.e. in the book, article, etc. already mentioned.

passim: This adverb derives from a Latin verb that means "stretch, extend, spread" (pandere > passus > passim). It follows then that passim means "all over", "here and there", "far and wide". You will encounter passim when a reference is to the general ideas in a whole book or article, as opposed to a specific page or pages thereof.

quod vide (abbreviated to q.v.): This Latin phrase means "which see" (vide is the imperative of video, "I see") and is commonly used in cross-references. There is a plural version of this phrase, quae vide (qq.v.), when you are directed to follow up more than one items (e.g. ideas, phrases, terms) elsewhere in the text. (Cf. seq. and seqq. above for singular vs. plural abbreviations.)

vide infra (abbreviated to v. inf.): This phrase means "see below". You already know that vide means "see", so infra has to be Latin for "below", right?

vide supra (abbreviated to v. sup.): It takes no superior (hint, hint...) knowledge of Latin to figure out that supra means "above", and therefore this phrase means "see above".

Source:

Merriam-Webster Online: http://www.m-w.com