 | Orgasm comes from the Greek, "to swell with wetness." |
| The word avocado comes from the Spanish word, aguacate, which in turn is derived from the Aztec word ahuacatl which meant testicle. |
| The word "gymnasium" comes from the Greek word gymnazein which means to "exercise naked." |
| The origin of the word "penis" is Latin, meaning tail. |
| Vanilla derives its name from the Latin word for vagina, probably because of the vanilla bean's likeness to female genitalia. |
| Sadism is named for the Marquis de Sade (1740-1914), a French writer who wrote such books as The 120 Days of Sodom and Justine, in which sexual torture and humiliation were continuous themes. |
| Masochism is named after Leopold von Sacher-Masoch (1836-1895), an Austrian lawyer and writer who wrote the classic sado-masochist novel, Venus in Furs. He was famous for his desires for pain and humiliation. |
| Gonorrhea, characterized by a discharge from the penis, has been around since Biblical times and was named by the Greek physician, Galen, in 150 A.D. The name translates as "the flow of seed." |
| Although the island of Lesbos is synonymous with lesbianism, the ancient Greeks associated it with the practice of fellatio. The Greek verbs lesbiazo and lesbizo refer to the act of fellatio. |
| The origin of the word ejaculate is from a Latin word ejaculari, meaning to "throw or shoot out." |
| The ancient Roman whore house, or brothel, was called a "lupanar" which means "she-wolves den." |
| Pornography, from Greek origin, means literally the writing of or about prostitutes. |
| The word eunuch, from the Green eunouchos and the Latin eunuchus, means keeper of the bedchamber. This is a reference to the role of the eunuch as the harem keeper. |
| The Greek legend of the fierce Amazon women warriors claims that as young girls they burned off their breast, enabling them to better handle a bow and arrow, hence acquiring the name amazone, meaning breastless. |
| The origin of the owrd "nymphomania" is from the Greek nymphe, meaning bride, and mania, meaning madness or frenzy. |
| The "French Kiss" was first known as maraichanage, a term to describe the prolonged, deep, tongue kiss practiced by the Maraichins, inhabitants of Brittany, France. |
