Definition
Latin: "in the notes." A phrase used in legal writing and annotation to indicate that a matter appears in the marginal or appended notes of a text, rather than in the body of the instrument or authority itself. In older legal manuscripts, treatises, and editions of statutes, substantive commentary, exceptions, and qualifications were frequently placed in notes rather than integrated into the main text. The phrase signals that the reader should consult the annotations or marginalia for the fuller treatment of the point at hand.
The phrase appears most commonly in two contexts: (1) as a locational signal in legal scholarship and judicial writing, directing attention to footnotes or marginal glosses; and (2) in the construction of wills and instruments, where testators or draftsmen incorporated references or directions "in the notes" rather than in the operative provisions of the document itself.
Common Confusion
In notis should not be confused with in marginibus (in the margins), though the two phrases describe overlapping practices. Historically, marginal annotations and appended notes served related but distinct functions: marginalia were often keyed to specific passages and added by editors or readers, while notes were more formal editorial or authorial additions appearing at the foot of the page or end of a section. The distinction matters when authenticating the source and authority of a given annotation in historical legal texts.
Why It Matters in Research
Researchers encountering in notis in historical legal sources face a navigational challenge: the referenced note may not appear in the edition they are consulting. Pre-nineteenth-century legal texts — treatises, abridgments, statute compilations, and year books — underwent substantial editorial revision across editions, and notes present in one edition were sometimes omitted, relocated, or expanded in another. A citation to in notis in a judicial opinion or secondary source may be tracing a passage that exists only in a specific edition.
The phrase also appears in the context of wills as a descriptor of where testamentary instructions or explanatory matter were placed. When a court or commentator notes that a provision appeared in notis, it raises questions of incorporation and testamentary intent that would have been treated differently across periods. Researchers working in probate records or equity proceedings from the seventeenth through nineteenth centuries should be alert to this usage, as the weight given to "notes" versus operative text was not uniformly settled.
The historical dictionaries reproduce the maxim In novo casu, novum remedium apponendum est — "a new remedy is to be applied to a new case" — immediately following the definition of in notis. This placement reflects the common editorial practice of grouping Latin maxims alphabetically, not a substantive connection between the two entries. Researchers should not infer that in notis carries any association with that maxim.
Historical Dictionary Support
Black's Law Dictionary (both first and second editions) and Rapalje & Lawrence are in agreement on the core definition: "in the notes." All three sources are notably spare, offering the translation and nothing more before moving to the adjacent maxim. None of the historical dictionaries addresses the practical significance of the phrase in textual scholarship or explains the distinction between notes and operative text in historical legal instruments. Rapalje & Lawrence alone provides the fuller Latin form of the following maxim and attributes it to Coke's Institutes (2 Inst. 3), which is useful for researchers following the citation trail.
What the historical sources do not address is the bibliographic instability of "the notes" in historical legal texts — a gap that is significant for anyone working with manuscript sources, early print editions of statutes, or annotated treatises. The laconic treatment across all three dictionaries reflects the phrase's function as a locational marker rather than a term of substantive legal art.