different between coitus vs fornication

English

Alternative forms

• coetus (rare)

Etymology

From Latin coitus.

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?k??.?.t?s/, /?k??.t?s/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?k??.t?s/, /?ko?.?.t?s/

Noun

coitus (countable and uncountable, plural coituses)

1. (formal or humorous) Sexual intercourse, especially involving penile-vaginal penetration.
   • 2006 October 2nd, Chuck Lorre and Bill Prady, The Big Bang Theory, “Pilot”, screenplay (revised first draft), act one, scene A (page 26):

     Wolowitz:   Hang on. There really is a lady here?
     Leonard:   Uh-huh.
     Wolowitz:   And you want us out because you’re anticipating coitus?
     Leonard:   No, she’s just a friend.
     Wolowitz:   So she’s available for coitus?
     Leonard:   No, she’s – –

Synonyms

• See Thesaurus:copulation

Derived terms

Translations

Latin

Alternative forms

• coetus

Etymology

From coe? +? -tus.

Pronunciation

• (Classical) IPA^(key): /?ko.i.tus/, [?ko?t??s?]
• (Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /?ko.i.tus/, [?k??it?us]

Noun

coitus m (genitive coit?s); fourth declension

1. a coming or meeting
2. a joining, combination
3. sexual intercourse, copulation

Declension

Fourth-declension noun.

Descendants

• Catalan: coit
• English: coitus
• Galician: coito
• Portuguese: coito
• Romanian: coit
• Swedish: coitus

References

• coitus in Charlton T. Lewis and Charles Short (1879) A Latin Dictionary, Oxford: Clarendon Press
• coitus in Charlton T. Lewis (1891) An Elementary Latin Dictionary, New York: Harper & Brothers
• coitus in Gaffiot, Félix (1934) Dictionnaire illustré Latin-Français, Hachette

English

Etymology

From Middle English fornicacioun, from Old French fornicacion, from Latin fornic?ti?, from fornix (“brothel”).

Pronunciation

• enPR: fôr'n?-k?'sh?n, IPA^(key): /?f??n??ke???n/
• Rhymes: -e???n

Noun

fornication (countable and uncountable, plural fornications)

1. (religion, law) Sexual intercourse by people who are not married, or which is considered illicit in another way.

   Hyponym: adultery

   • 1589 or 90, Christopher Marlowe, The Jew of Malta, Act IV:

     FRIAR BARNARDINE. Thou hast committed—

     BARABAS. Fornication: but that was in another country;

     And besides, the wench is dead.

   • 1604, William Shakespeare, Measure for Measure, Act V, Scene 1:

     I am the sister of one Claudio,

     Condemned upon the act of fornication

     To lose his head, condemned by Angelo

   • 1816, Cobbett's Parliamentary History of England: From the Norman Conquest, in 1066, to the Year, 1803, page 623:

     In one case, where a man was sued for committing fornication with his wife before marriage, it appeared, that seven years after her death he was cited to stand as a prisoner at their bar, though he had lived with her for nine years, […]

   • 1893, The Southwestern Reporter, page 840:

     ... that he was a married man at the time is a necessary allegation, as the allegation that he was an unmarried man would have been necessary had he been charged with the crime of incest, by having committed fornication with his daughter.

   • 2013, Arthur W. Calhoun, The American Family in the Colonial Period, Courier Corporation (?ISBN)

     Thus, at Roxbury, 1678, Hanna Hopkins was censured in the church for fornication with her husband before marriage and for fleeing from justice into Rhode Island.

2. (colloquial) Sexual intercourse in general; sex.
   • 2012, Geoffrey Kennell, The Upper Crust, Xlibris Corporation (?ISBN), page 185:

     For a moment he stared at the back of the Lascar, wondering if he were the youth that he had disturbed during fornication with his Engineer, then dismissed all thoughts of the previous night, he was getting old, and suspicious, what did it matter […]

Synonyms

• see also Thesaurus:copulation

Derived terms

• fornicatory

Related terms

• fornicate

Translations

References

• fornication at OneLook Dictionary Search
• fornication in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.