On Monday night (July 11), the VH1 Hip Hop Honors paid tribute to some of the genre's most influential women, including Queen Latifah, Lil Kim, Salt-N-Pepa and Missy Elliott. It was an evening filled with tribute performances and tremendous gratitude for the contributions each honoree has made over the years, with Missy crediting fellow recipients Salt-N-Pepa for inspiring her own music career.

"I want to thank God first of all cause without him I wouldn’t be him as far as I’m concerned. I most definitely got to give God the credit for the talents that I have," Missy says in the above video in which she doles out thanks. "I want to thank these women that are sitting up here. These women inspire me. I know all of their records and they are not just people that I’ve met in the industry, these are my sisters. We talk on the phone, we go to each other’s houses. It’s real. So I want to thank ya’ll, I love y’all so much. Salt-N-Pepa is the reason that I rap and so me being up here is…" Missy trails off before thanking Timbaland, Pharrell and many of her other collaborators, ending her speech with, "This means a lot to all of us. I’m so emotional. I dedicate this to Aaliyah. Aaliyah, I love you."

While Missy has had a storied career spanning multiple decades, she recently upped the ante on her cultural legacy, performing at the Super Bowl Halftime Show alongside Katy Perry and making a musical comeback with a string of singles including "Ghostbusters (I'm Not Afraid)". Her collaborations with such artists as J. Cole and A$AP Ferg further cement her timeless appeal. Watch Missy deliver her thanks in the video above and witness a mashup of Missy Elliott's dance-inducing tracks like "Get Your Freak On" and "Lose Control" performed by Remy Ma, Trina and Nelly Furtado below.