Etymograph

English

monte

Monte comes from Spanish monte ‘mountain’, and goes back to Proto-Indo-European *men- ‘to think, mind’.

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*men-1‘to think, mind’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*móntis1reconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*monts1reconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEmōns1‘mountain, mount’
  5. Spanishc. 1500–presentmonte2‘mountain’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 2022monte2

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, Spanish monte
  2. 2 Wiktionary, English monte
  3. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 2022, Michael Paulson, Suzan-Lori Parks Is on Broadway, Off Broadway and Everywhere: “A starry 20th-anniversary revival of “Topdog/Underdog,” her Pulitzer Prize-winning…”.

Lineage

  1. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*men-Wiktionary, Spanish monte‘to think, mind’reconstructed
  2. Proto-Indo-Europeanc. 4500–2500 BCE*móntisWiktionary, Spanish montereconstructed
  3. Proto-Italicc. 1500–700 BCE*montsWiktionary, Spanish montereconstructed
  4. Latinc. 75 BCE–200 CEmōnsWiktionary, Spanish monte‘mountain, mount’
  5. Spanishc. 1500–presentmonteWiktionary, English monte‘mountain’
  6. Englishearliest quotation 2022monteWiktionary, English monte. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 2022, Michael Paulson, Suzan-Lori Parks Is on Broadway, Off Broadway and Everywhere: “A starry 20th-anniversary revival of “Topdog/Underdog,” her Pulitzer Prize-winning…”

The story

Borrowed from Spanish monte (‘mountain’): in the sense of the card game, referring to the stack of unplayed cards.

Full etymology on Wiktionary

Linked words

through Proto-Indo-European *men- ‘to think, mind’

music, mind, money, remain, museum, comment, mental, mouth, auto, min, permanent, mountain, mention, monitor, maya, monster, demonstration, monetary, mentor, amnesty, muse, mint, dementia, menace, ming, prominence, mas, mandarin, imminent, mania, amnesia, eminent, manic, mosaic, monument, monk, mantra, eminence, muster, remnant, 118 more

through Proto-Italic *monts

surmount, 11 more

through Latin mōns ‘mountain, mount’

amount, mount, mons, montane, 12 more

Today it means

noun A game in which three or four cards are dealt face-up and players bet on which of them will first be matched in suit by others dealt.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “monte”; the older steps come from the Wiktionary entry for Spanish monte. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / Proto-Indo-European *men- / monte

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