la leche

petegray petegray at btinternet.com
Thu Feb 1 20:00:45 UTC 2001


> What, then, are we to make of a feminine form for "penis" in Greek (i psoli)?

Firstly there are many feminine words for male things, and vice versa, in
languages that have grammatical gender.   The interesting thing is that even
native speakers of the languages can laugh at the anomaly - which proves the
rule being suggested!  Sometimes there are doublets of different gender,
such as the French poitrine and poitrail for "chest".

Secondly, "i psoli" comes from the feminine of an adjective meaning "with
the foreskin pulled back".  It (and masculine forms of the adjective) are
found in classical literature.  It clearly was related to an unexpressed
feminine word in Classical Greek.

Peter



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