sodomia

Forms

sodomia f (plural sodomias)^[1] The first record, of 1433, is spelt ssodomja.^[2][3] A private letter of 1556 has sodomya.^[4]

Etymology

It is borrowed from Late Latin sodomia, the Latin word of the Church, formed from the name of the biblical city Sodoma with the suffix -ia.^[2][1][5] Houaiss calls the Latin word medieval and thinks it probably came into Portuguese through French sodomie, recorded from the 12th century;^[2][3] Cunha derives the Portuguese word from the French one outright.^[2][3] The DHLF dates the Latin word to the 6th century and has the French borrowed from it about 1150.^[6]

Nascentes, Aurélio's first edition and the DLP explain it instead as formed in Portuguese from the place name with the same suffix.^[7][8][9] Sodom was the city where, in the Bible, the practice was said to have been found.^[2][6]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first record is of 1433, in the form ssodomja, with the sense of anal intercourse.^[2][3] Pereira's Latin gloss of 1697 calls it praepostera libido, “perverse lust”.^[10]

Semantic evolution

Vieira (1871–1874) defines it as the sin against nature and explains the name from Sodom, a city given to every kind of lust.^[11] Silva Bastos (1912) glosses it also as homosexuality.^[12] The modern dictionaries limit it to anal intercourse between men or between a man and a woman.^[2][13] Michaelis also records the older wider use for sexual relations between people of the same sex, with the medical distinctions of sodomia perfeita and imperfeita, and the DLP a sense “illegal or socially unacceptable sexual behaviour”.^[14][9]

Timeline

• 1433 – first record, spelt ssodomja.^[2]
• 1556 – sodomya in a private letter.^[4]
• 1697 – Pereira glosses it praepostera libido.^[10]
• 1871–1874 – Vieira: “sin against nature”, named after Sodom.^[11]

Meanings

Noun

1. sodomy: anal intercourse, between men or between a man and a woman.^[2][13][1]
2. (dated) Sexual relations between people of the same sex.^[14][8]
3. Sexual behaviour that is illegal or socially unacceptable.^[9]

Related words

• sodomita
• Latin Sodoma
• French sodomie

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i Houaiss, Antônio; Villar, Mauro de Salles (2001), Dicionário Houaiss da língua portuguesa, Rio de Janeiro: Objetiva, p. s.v. sodomia
3. ^ a b c d Cunha, Antônio Geraldo da (2010), Dicionário etimológico da língua portuguesa, 4th ed., Rio de Janeiro: Lexikon, p. s.v. sodomia
4. ^ a b CLUL (ed.) (2014), P.S. Post Scriptum: Arquivo Digital de Escrita Quotidiana em Portugal e Espanha na Época Moderna, Lisboa: Centro de Linguística da Universidade de Lisboa, http://ps.clul.ul.pt, p. s.v. sodomia
5. ^ Dicionário Priberam da Língua Portuguesa, Lisboa: Priberam Informática, https://dicionario.priberam.org, p. s.v. sodomia
6. ^ a b Rey, Alain, ed. (1992), Dictionnaire historique de la langue française, Paris: Le Robert, p. s.v. sodomie
7. ^ Nascentes, Antenor (1966), Dicionário etimológico resumido, Rio de Janeiro: Instituto Nacional do Livro, p. s.v. sodomia
8. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda (1975), Novo dicionário da língua portuguesa, 1st ed., Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira, p. 1340
9. ^ a b c Academia das Ciências de Lisboa, Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, revised online edition (2023–) of the Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa Contemporânea (2001), https://dicionario.acad-ciencias.pt, p. s.v. sodomia
10. ^ a b Pereira, Bento (1697), Thesouro da lingoa portuguesa, in the 1697 edition of his Prosodia (1st ed. 1647; CLP transcription, Universidade de Aveiro), p. s.v. sodomia
11. ^ a b Vieira, Frei Domingos (1871–1874), Grande Diccionario Portuguez ou Thesouro da lingua portugueza, 5 vols., Porto: Ernesto Chardron e Bartholomeu H. de Moraes, p. 5, 563
12. ^ Silva Bastos, José Timóteo da (1912), Diccionario etymologico, prosodico e orthographico da lingua portugueza, Lisboa: Parceria António Maria Pereira, p. s.v. sodomia
13. ^ a b Ferreira, Aurélio Buarque de Holanda, Novo dicionário Aurélio da língua portuguesa, digital edition, p. s.v. sodomia
14. ^ a b Michaelis: Moderno Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa, São Paulo: Melhoramentos (online as Michaelis Dicionário Brasileiro da Língua Portuguesa, https://michaelis.uol.com.br), p. s.v. sodomia