mons

See also: Appendix:Variations of "mons"

English

Etymology

Borrowed from Latin mōns (“mountain”). Doublet of mount.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mɒnz/
• Rhymes: -ɒnz

Noun

mons (plural montes)

1. (obsolete, palmistry) One of the fleshy areas at the base of the fingers; a mount.
2. (anatomy) Ellipsis of mons pubis.
   • 2021, Leone Ross, This One Sky Day, Faber & Faber Limited, page 316:

     Hesitantly, she used one finger to stroke the very top of the mons, surprised at its fatty, downy fullness — unfamiliar, despite a life of touching herself.

3. (astronomy, geology) An extraterrestrial mountain or volcano.

   Olympus Mons (on Mars)

   Maxwell Montes (on Venus)

Related terms

• mons veneris
• mons Venus

 

Translations

fleshy area at the base of fingers

• Finnish: kukkula (fi)

mons pubis — see mons pubis

astronomy: mountain on a planet or moon

• Finnish: vuori (fi)

Anagrams

• MNOs, nMOS, noms

Catalan

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): (Central, Balearic, Valencia) [ˈmons]

Noun

mons

1. plural of món (“world”)

Etymology 2

Alternative forms

• mos (standard)

Pronunciation

• (Balearic, Central) IPA^(key): /muns/ (always unstressed)
• (Valencia) IPA^(key): /mons/ (always unstressed)

Determiner

mons

1. (dialectal) masculine plural of mon

Haitian Creole

Etymology

Borrowed from French monstre (“monster”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /mɔ̃s/

Noun

mons

1. (mythology) monster (a terrifying or dangerous mystical creature)

Latin

Etymology

From Proto-Italic *monts, from Proto-Indo-European *món-tis, from Proto-Indo-European *men- (“to stand out, to tower”). Compare Old Breton monid, Breton menez, Cornish menydh, Welsh mynydd.

Pronunciation

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /mons/, [mõːs̠]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /mons/, [mɔns]

Noun

mōns m (genitive montis); third declension

1. mountain, mount
   • c. 52 BCE, Julius Caesar, Commentarii de Bello Gallico 1.1:

     Aquītānia ā Garumnā flūmine ad Pȳrēnaeōs mōntēs et eam partem Ōceanī quae est ad Hispāniam pertinet...

     Aquitania extends from the Garonne river to the Pyrenaean mountains and that part of the ocean which reaches Iberia...

   • 29 BCE – 19 BCE, Virgil, Aeneid 1.60–62:

     Sed pater omnipotēns spēluncīs abdidit ātrīs,
     hoc metuēns, mōlemque et montīs īnsuper altōs
     imposuit, [...].

     But the all-powerful Father [Jupiter] had hidden [the winds] in dark caverns, [because he was] fearing this [destruction], and above [them] he placed massive high mountains, [...].
     (The words “molemque et montis” exemplify alliteration and hendiadys.)

   • 397 CE – 400 CE, Aurelius Augustinus Hipponensis, Cōnfessiōnēs 10.8:

     et eunt hominēs mīrārī alta montium et ingentēs flūctūs maris et lātissimōs lāpsūs flūminum et ōceanī ambitum et gȳrōs sīderum, et relinquunt sē ipsōs, …

     And men go to marvel at the heights of mountains and the huge waves of the sea and the widest courses of rivers and the flow of the ocean and the circuits of the stars, and they forsake themselves, […].

2. hill
   • 8 CE, Ovid, Fasti 1.517:

     montibus hīs ōlim tōtus prōmittitur orbis

     To these hills, one day, the whole world is promised.

3. (metonymically) towering mass, heap, great quantity
4. (metonymically) mountain rock, rock (in general) (poetically)
5. (metonymically) mountain beasts, wild beasts (Late Latin, poetically)
6. (metonymically) (of that which is obtained from the mountains) marble, marble column

Declension

Third-declension noun (i-stem).

	singular	plural
nominative	mōns	montēs
genitive	montis	montium
dative	montī	montibus
accusative	montem	montēs montīs
ablative	monte	montibus
vocative	mōns	montēs

Derived terms

• Mōns Casīnus
• montānus
• montāna
• monticellus
• monticola
• monticulus
• Montīnus
• montivagus
• montuōsus

Proverbs

• parturiunt montēs, nāscētur rīdiculus mūs (“much is promised, but little will be performed”, literally “the mountains are in labour, a ridiculous mouse will be born”).
• montēs aurī pollicērī (“to make great promises”, literally “to promise mountains of gold”).

Descendants

• Balkan Romance:
  • Aromanian: munti, munte
  • Istro-Romanian: munte
  • Megleno-Romanian: munti
  • Romanian: munte
• Dalmatian:
  • muant
• Italo-Romance:
  • Corsican: monti
  • Italian: monte
  • Sicilian: munti
• North Italian:
  • Istriot: monto
  • Venetan: mónte
• Rhaeto-Romance:
  • Friulian: mont
• Gallo-Romance:
  • Catalan: munt
  • French: mont
  • Occitan: mont
• Ibero-Romance:
  • Asturian: monte
  • Old Galician-Portuguese: monte m
    • Galician: monte m
    • Portuguese: monte m (see there for further descendants)
  • Sardinian: monte
  • Spanish: monte
• → Old English: munt
  • Middle English: mount, mont, mounte, mownt, munt
    • English: mount
    • Scots: munt
• Vulgar Latin: *montāre (see there for further descendants)

References

• “mons”, in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• “mons”, in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• mons in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré latin-français, Hachette.
• Carl Meißner, Henry William Auden (1894) Latin Phrase-Book‎^[1], London: Macmillan and Co.
  • wooded hills: montes vestiti silvis
    
  • the top of a mountain: summus mons
    
  • at the foot of the mountain: sub radicibus montis, in infimo monte, sub monte
    
  • to be shut in on all sides by very high mountains: altissimis montibus undique contineri
    
  • the town lies at the foot of a mountain: oppidum monti subiectum est
    
  • to run obliquely down the hill: obliquo monte decurrere
    
  • the Nile rushes down from very high mountains: Nilus praecipitat ex altissimis montibus
    
  • to hold a mountain: tenere montem (B. G. 1. 22)
    
  • to take up one's position on a mountain: consistere in monte
    
  • to occupy the foot of a hill: considere sub monte (sub montis radicibus)
    

Swedish

Noun

mons

1. definite genitive singular of mo