Mont de Piété

plural Monts de Piété

1. A European pawnbroking establishment, especially one with charitable aims.

   Well, I did not find that, but I did find the receipt from the Mont de Piété for a parure of emeralds on which half a million francs had been lent.

   2014, Emmauska Orczy, Castles in the Air, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   It is interesting to note that one of the entrances to the Mont de Piété is reserved for clients who wish to raise money on deeds, and I have seen cabmen very busy in bringing to it people who quite shamelessly hold their papers in their hands.

   1924, Edward Verrall Lucas, A Wanderer in Paris, →ISBN

   She has founded and regulated a sort of Mont de Piété, of a peculiar kind, which would be an admirable institution elsewhere, if it could be multiplied like the infant schools; for it is among the very small number of those which merit the name given to them, for money is there lent without interest and without securities.

   2014, Sarah Lee, Memoirs of Baron Cuvier, →ISBN, page 165