c. 1200, mon, "lamentation, mourning, weeping; complaining, the expressing of complaints; a complaint; lover's complaint; accusation, charge," perhaps from an unrecorded Old English *mān "complaint," from mānan, a variant of mænan "complain, moan," also "tell, intend, signify" (see mean (v.1)); but OED discounts this connection. Meaning "long, low inarticulate murmur expressing grief or pain" is by 1670s, "with onomatopoeic suggestion" [OED].