from Latin mons (plural montes) "mountain" (see mount (n.)); used in English in various anatomical senses, especially mons Veneris "mountains of Love," fleshy eminence atop the vaginal opening, 1690s; often mons for short.
mons (mŏnz)
n. pl. mon·tes (mŏn'tēz)
An anatomical prominence or slight elevation above the general level of the surface.
Money (1894+)
municipality, Walloon Region, southwestern Belgium, set on a knoll between the Trouille and Haine rivers, at the junction of the Nimy-Blaton Canal and the Canal du Centre. The Nimy-Blaton Canal replaces that of Mono Conde, built by Napoleon, which has been filled and now serves as a vehicle route to France. Peopled since prehistoric times, Mons originated as a Roman camp (Castrilocus) in the 3rd century; it grew around an abbey founded (c. 650) by St. Waudru, or Waltrudis, daughter of the Count of Hainaut. During the 9th century, turreted ramparts encircled the small town. Recognized by Charlemagne as the capital of Hainaut (804), it prospered as a cloth-weaving centre between the 14th and the 16th century. Mons, a stronghold and frontier town, was well fortified. The most extensive defenses were built by the distinguished French military engineer Sebastien Le Prestre de Vauban. It was repeatedly attacked and occupied by Dutch, Spanish, French, and English forces in the 16th-18th-century wars and was ruled by the French, Spanish, Dutch, and Austrians prior to 1830. The city was the site of the first battle between the British and the Germans in 1914, ending in the British "Retreat from Mons." The city endured German aerial bombardment during 1940.