Already in medieval Latin palaeography, the sign that in Spanish came to be called "virgulilla" (meaning "little comma") was used over a vowel to indicate a following nasal consonant ("n" or "m") that had been omitted, as in "tãtus" for "tantus" or "quã" for "quam". This usage was passed on to other languages using the Latin alphabet although it was subsequently dropped by most. Spanish retained it, however, in some specific cases, particularly to indicate the palatal nasal, the sound that is now spelt as "ñ". The word "tilde" comes from Spanish, derived by metathesis of the word "título" as "tidlo", this originally from Latin TITVLVS "title" or "heading"; compare "cabildo" with Latin CAPITULUM.