Maxima (music) notation for examples. The name for this note in European languages is derived from two of the three Latin names, either "maxima" or "larga". (On "larga" as a term, see , 30–31 : "Nomina vero ipsarum sunt haec, scilicet larga, longa, brevis, semibrevis et minima".) In modern theoretical contexts, it is occasionally called an octuple note (; ; ) or an octuple whole note . Maxima (music) A maxima, duplex longa, larga (in British usage: large), octuple note, octuple whole note, or octuple entire musical note was a musical note used commonly in thirteenth and fourteenth century music and occasionally
Mensural notation and short notes (minims and crotchets), or groups of three short notes. In the 13th century, all of these were notated using only the longa and breve notes. A longa was automatically understood to fill a whole ternary metric group whenever it was in the neighborhood of other notes that did the same, i.e., whenever it was followed either by another longa or by a full group of three breves. When, however, the longa was preceded or followed by a single breve, then both filled a ternary group together. Thus, the longa had to be reduced to a value of