1660s, "one who has forsaken a doctrine or system regarded as true, an apostate," from pervert (v.). The psychological sense of "one who has a perversion of the sexual instinct" is attested by 1897 (Havelock Ellis), originally especially of homosexuals, short for sexual pervert, which is attested by 1889.
"copulation, sexual intercourse," 1848, scientific use of Latin coitus "a meeting together; sexual union," past participle of coire "to come together, meet," from assimilated form of com "together" (see co-) + ire (past participle itus) "to come, to go," (from PIE root *ei- "to go").
In Middle English nativized as coite (early 15c.). Coitus was used in English in general senses of "meeting, uniting," and also in reference to magnetic force, planetary conjunction, etc., before the sexual sense came to predominate.
Coitus interruptus, "sexual intercourse in which the penis is voluntarily withdrawn from the vagina before ejaculation, for the purpose of avoiding conception," is from 1886 (from 1885 in German publications). Coitus reservatus in reference to prolonged copulation by deliberate control is from 1890 in English (1880 in German).
modern plant genus, 1771, Latin, taken by botanists from Greek Silphion, the name of a North African Mediterranean plant whose identity has been lost, the gum or juice of which was prized by the ancients as a condiment and a medicine. Probably the word is ultimately of African origin.
1926 (pansexualism is from 1917), from pan- + sexual. Originally in reference to the view that the sex instinct plays the primary part in all human activity, mental and physical; Freud's critics held this to be his view, and the word became a term of reproach leveled at early psychology. Meaning "not limited in sexual choice" is attested by 1972. Related: Pansexuality.
"perform oral sex on," c. 1917, from French (adj.), reflecting Anglo-Saxon equation of Gallic culture and sexual sophistication. Related: Frenched; frenching.
1680s, "aware of one's action or oneself," a word of the English Enlightenment (Locke was using it by 1690, along with self-consciousness "state of being aware of oneself, consciousness of one's own identity"), from self- + conscious. The morbid sense of "preoccupied with one's own personality, conscious of oneself as an object of observation to others" is attested by 1834 (J.S. Mill). Related: Self-consciously.
