mota

mota (uncountable)

1. Alternative form of mootah.
   • 1988, “Providence”, in Mike Watt (lyrics), Sonic Youth (music), Daydream Nation, performed by Sonic Youth, Enigma Records:

     Thurston... I think it's 10:30. We're calling from Providence, Rhode Island. Did you find your shit? You gotta watch the mota, Thurston, your fuckin memory just goes out the window.

• TMAO, atom, Mato, toma, Amto, moat, Atom, Moat, atmo

Borrowed from Latin monētam (“mint, money”).

• IPA^(key): /mota/ [mo.t̪a]
• Rhymes: -ota, -a
• Hyphenation: mo‧ta

mota inan

1. type, kind, class
2. (taxonomy) species

   Synonym: espezie

• “mota”, in Euskaltzaindiaren Hiztegia [Dictionary of the Basque Academy] (in Basque), Euskaltzaindia [Royal Academy of the Basque Language]
• “mota”, in Orotariko Euskal Hiztegia [General Basque Dictionary], Euskaltzaindia, 1987–2005

Borrowed from Medieval Latin mota (“a mound, hill”), of Germanic origin, perhaps via Frankish *mot, *motta (“mud, peat, bog, turf”), from Proto-Germanic *mutô. Compare French motte.

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic) [ˈmɔ.tə]
• IPA^(key): (Valencia) [ˈmɔ.ta]

mota f (plural motes)

1. mound, hillock
2. (historical) motte
3. clod, block of soil
4. hummock, tussock
5. levee

• castell de mota

• “mota”, in Diccionari de la llengua catalana [Dictionary of the Catalan Language] (in Catalan), second edition, Institute of Catalan Studies [Catalan: Institut d'Estudis Catalans], April 2007
• Alcover, Antoni Maria; Moll, Francesc de Borja (1963), “mota”, in Diccionari català-valencià-balear (in Catalan)
• “mota”, in Gran Diccionari de la Llengua Catalana, Grup Enciclopèdia Catalana, 2026

• mouta

From Medieval Latin motta.^[1]

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔta/ [ˈmɔ.t̪ɐ]
• Rhymes: -ɔta
• Hyphenation: mo‧ta

mota f (plural motas)

1. (dated) motte, rampart
   • 1395, Miguel González Garcés, editor, Historia de La Coruña. Edad Media, A Coruña: Caixa Galicia, page 557:

     que o dicto martin bezerra e a sua moller façan tirar et derribar todos los penedos et pedras de mota que estan cabo da dicta casa sobre la terra os que poderen tirar con palancos de ferro et de madeyro et a maos de omes et que os tiren da mota et que os lançen contra o rrio et façan a mota chaa

     the aforementioned Martin Becerra and his wife should order the toppling of every boulder and every stone of the motte which is by the aforementioned house, with iron levers, and wood levers, and by the hands of men; they should be removed from the motte and thrown into the river, and they should flatten the motte

2. mound

• A Mótega
• Mota

• Seoane, Ernesto Xosé González; Granja, María Álvarez de la; Agrelo, Ana Isabel Boullón (2006–2022), “mota”, in Dicionario de Dicionarios do galego medieval [Dictionary of dictionaries of Medieval Galician] (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega
• Barreiro, Xavier Varela; Guinovart, Xavier Gómez (2006–2018), “mota”, in Corpus Xelmírez: corpus lingüístico da Galicia medieval [Corpus Xelmírez: linguistic corpus of Medieval Galicia] (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega
• Antón Luís Santamarina Fernández, editor (2006–2013), “mota”, in Dicionario de Dicionarios da lingua galega [Dictionary of Dictionaries of the Galician language] (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega
• Antón Luís Santamarina Fernández, Ernesto Xosé González Seoane, María Álvarez de la Granja, editors (2003–2018), “mota”, in Tesouro informatizado da lingua galega (in Galician), Santiago de Compostela: Instituto da Lingua Galega
• “mota”, in Dicionário Estraviz de galego (in Galician), 2014–2026

mōta

1. romanization of 𐌼𐍉𐍄𐌰

From English motor.

• IPA^(key): /móː.tàː/
  • (Standard Kano Hausa) IPA^(key): [móː.tàː]

mōtā̀ f (plural mōtōcī, possessed form mōtàr̃)

1. automobile, car

Inherited from Latin maltha (“mineral pitch”). The original [ɫ] appears to have vocalized to [u̯] in pre-literary Tuscan, with the resulting [au̯] regularly yielding [ɔ], as in Latin aurum (“gold”) > Italian òro. Doublet of malta. Less probably of Germanic origin, related to English mud.

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔ.ta/
• Rhymes: -ɔta
• Hyphenation: mò‧ta

mota f (plural mote)

1. mud

   Synonym: fango

• moticchio
• motiglio
• motoso

• Alberto Nocentini, Alessandro Parenti, “l'Etimologico — Vocabolario della lingua italiana”, Le Monnier, 2010, →ISBN

• Toma, toma

From Proto-Cariban *mota; compare Apalaí mota, Trió mota, Wayana mota, Waiwai mota, Akawaio mota, Pemon mota, Ye'kwana mota, Yao (South America) hoomotaly.

• (Venezuela, West Suriname) IPA^(key): [moːta]
• (East Suriname) IPA^(key): [moʔta]

mota (possessed motary)

1. shoulder

• Courtz, Hendrik (2008), A Carib grammar and dictionary‎^[1], Toronto: Magoria Books, →ISBN, page 320
• Ahlbrinck, Willem (1931), “motarï”, in Encyclopaedie der Karaïben, Amsterdam: Koninklijke Akademie van Wetenschappen, page 305; republished as Willem Ahlbrinck, Doude van Herwijnen, transl., L'Encyclopédie des Caraïbes‎^[2], Paris, 1956, page 297

mōta

1. inflection of mōtus:
   1. nominative/vocative feminine singular
   2. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter plural

mōtā

1. ablative feminine singular of mōtus

• "mota", in Charles du Fresne du Cange, Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔ.ta/
• Rhymes: -ɔta
• Syllabification: mo‧ta

mota

1. third-person singular present of motać

• Rhymes: -ɔtɐ
• Hyphenation: mo‧ta

mota f (plural motas)

1. (chiefly Portugal) motorcycle

   Synonyms: moto, motocicleta

• “mota”, in Dicionário Aulete Digital (in Portuguese), Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon Editora Digital, 2008–2026
• “mota”, in Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa (in Portuguese), Lisbon: Priberam, 2008–2026

Borrowed from German Motte.

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔ.ta/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔta
• Syllabification: mo‧ta

mota f

1. moth (insect)

   Hypernym: ôwada

• mota in silling.org

Uncertain; possibly borrowed from Germanic, from Proto-Germanic *muþraz (“sediment”), cognate to Italian mota, English mud, Dutch modder.^[1] Or, possibly from Iberian.^[2]

• IPA^(key): /ˈmota/ [ˈmo.t̪a]
• Rhymes: -ota
• Syllabification: mo‧ta

mota f (plural motas)

1. speck (tiny spot or particle), mote

   Synonyms: partícula, migaja, ápice

2. (uncountable, slang, Latin America) marijuana

   Synonyms: bareta, hierba, macoña, maría, marimba, pasto

3. (textile) pill, fluff

• “mota”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8.1, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 15 December 2025

Borrowed from English motor.

• Audio (Kenya):

  (file)

mota class IX (plural mota class X)

1. motor, engine

From mot +‎ -a

mota (present motar, preterite motade, supine motat, imperative mota)

1. to (physically) prevent from going farther (despite attempts), to block

   Den arga mannen försökte ta sig in på puben, men motades av dörrvakterna

   The angry man tried to enter the pub, but was blocked by the bouncers

2. (with a particle like bort (“away”) or undan (“away”)) to (physically) drive away

   Livvakterna motade bort paparazzifotograferna

   The bodyguards pushed (drove (physically)) the paparazzi away

• mota Olle i grind

• “mota”, in Svenska Akademiens ordböcker [Dictionaries of the Swedish Academy] (in Swedish)
• mota in Elof Hellquist, Svensk etymologisk ordbok (1st ed., 1922)

mota

1. river

• “mota”, in Dicionário infopédia: Tetum-English, Porto: Porto Editora, 2003–2026

Compare Italian monte

mota f (plural mote)

1. heap, pile

mota

1. genitive singular of mot

From Proto-Cariban *mota (“shoulder”).

• IPA^(key): [mota]

mota (obligatorily possessed; possessed motai)

1. shoulder

• Cáceres, Natalia (2011), Grammaire Fonctionnelle-Typologique du Ye’kwana‎^[3], Lyon, page 115