Sodomite
/ˈsɒd.ə.maɪt/noun
A person who engages in sodomy, a term that is historical, legally variable, and often offensive when applied to people.
Did you know?Genesis does not explicitly describe the people of Sodom as homosexual; later Jewish and Christian writers expanded the city’s alleged sin into the broad sexual category now associated with the word.
Etymological Timeline
Biblical Hebrew
Hebrew
סְדֹם (Sədōm)
“Sodom, the place-name of the city described in Genesis”
Ancient Greek
Greek
Σόδομα (Sódoma)
“Sodom, rendered in the Greek Septuagint”
Late Antiquity
Ecclesiastical Latin
Sodomita
“A person associated with Sodom; later, a person accused of sexual acts categorized as sodomy”
12th Century
Old French
sodomite
“A person accused of sodomy”
14th Century
Middle English
sodomite
“A person regarded as practicing prohibited sexual acts”
Modern English
English
sodomite
“A historical or offensive term for a person associated with sodomy”