Okay, in the footnotes of several books I’ve been reading, I’ve noticed that one of the sources sited was something called, Ibid. Does this stand for something, or mean something?
What is it?
It’s an abbreviation for the Latin word ibidem, meaning “the same.” It means that the source for that note is the same as the previous note.
“in the same place” not “the same”.
Ack, I stand corrected. I had idem rolling around in the back of my head at the same time.
And since Ibid. is an abbreviation, be sure to put a period after it.
While we’re on the subject of footnote Latin we could also note
loc. cit. = locus citatus = in the passage or place just quoted
op. cit. = opere citato = in the work cited
passim = everywhere, throughout
et. al. and the others
Ugh. In jr. high, which was about 10 years ago now, I had to write a research paper and use all these awful Ibid.s and op. cit.s. It was horrible. I’m so glad that the standard seems to have shifted to parenthetical references, as that was the only paper with footnotes I ever had to write and I find parenthetical references to be much, much easier.