phallus

Etymology

It is borrowed from Latin phallus,^[2][3][4][5] which in classical Latin meant the penis in a single inscription, and in post-classical Latin from the 4th century also an image of it.^[2] The Latin word is from Ancient Greek φαλλός (phallós, “penis; an image of the penis carried in the cult of Dionysus”).^[2][3][4] The American Heritage Dictionary and the Oxford Dictionary of English give the Latin source as Late Latin.^[6][7] Klein derives the Greek word from Proto-Indo-European *bʰl̥-no-, and relates it to φάλλαινα (phállaina, “whale”) and φάλλη (phállē, “whale”),^[8][4] and to Latin follis (“a pair of bellows, originally a leather sack”).^[8] Etymonline and Barnhart trace it to *bʰel- (“to blow, swell”), also the source of Old Norse boli (“bull”) and Old English bulluc (“little bull”), whence bullock;^[3][4][8][6] Merriam-Webster thinks it probably akin to flō (“to blow”).^[5] The OED compares French phallus, earlier phalle, recorded in Middle French as fallot in 1570, and Italian fallo (1630).^[2]

Earliest recorded meaning

An image of the penis as a symbol of the generative power of nature, especially the one carried in the festivals of Dionysus: 1613, in Samuel Purchas's Pilgrimage.^[2][4] Etymonline dates it to the 1610s and Dictionary.com to 1605–15.^[3][9]

Semantic evolution

The word entered English as a term of religious history, for images of the penis venerated in various religions.^[2][3] In 1759 the botanist John Hill used Phallus for a genus of fungi with a phallus-shaped receptacle; scientific Latin had used the name since 1564.^[2] Use for the penis itself, often in a symbolic sense, is found in the revised OED from 1807, in N. B. Halhed;^[2] the 1989 edition of the OED had dated this sense from 1924, and Etymonline dates it by 1891.^[10][3] In psychoanalysis the word came to mean the penis as a symbolic object rather than as an organ,^[10][11] and in biology it is also the embryonic tissue that becomes the penis or the clitoris, and the copulatory organ of male insects and other invertebrates.^[11][12] The adjective phallic is recorded from 1789, in Thomas Twining's translation of Aristotle's Poetics.^[4]

Timeline

• 1613 – an image of the penis venerated as a symbol of generative power.^[2][4]
• 1759 – (botany) a genus of fungi.^[2]
• 1807 – the penis, especially as a symbol.^[2] Etymonline dates this sense by 1891.^[3]

Meanings

Noun

1. A penis, especially one regarded as a symbol of male power or fertility.^[2][13][12]
2. An image or symbol of the penis, as an object of worship representing the generative power of nature: The festival procession carried a wooden phallus.^[13][2][12]
3. (psychoanalysis) The penis as a symbolic object of infantile sexuality and desire.^[11][10]
4. (embryology) The undifferentiated tissue in an embryo that develops into the penis or the clitoris.^[11][12]
5. (zoology) A copulatory organ of a male invertebrate, especially of an insect.^[12]

Related words

• ithyphallic
• phallic
• bull
• bullock
• blow

Usage notes

The plural is phalli or phalluses.^[13][12][14] The Greek-style form phallos is also used.^[2][1]

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f g Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
4. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
5. ^ a b Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
6. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
7. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
8. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ a b c Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C., eds. (1989), The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
11. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
12. ^ a b c d e f Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
13. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
14. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press