copulation

From Middle French copulation, from Latin copulo (“I join, unite, connect”)

• (UK) IPA^(key): /kɒp.jəˈleɪ.ʃən/
• Rhymes: -eɪʃən

copulation (countable and uncountable, plural copulations)

1. (countable) The act of coupling or joining; union; conjunction.
2. (uncountable) Sexual procreation between a man and a woman or transfer of the sperm from male to female; usually applied to the mating process in nonhuman animals; coitus; coition.
   • ca.1909, Mark Twain, Letters from the Earth, Letter VIII:

     Solomon, who was one of the Deity's favorities, had a copulation cabinet composed of seven hundred wives and three hundred concubines.

   • 1979, J.G. Ballard, The Unlimited Dream Company, chapter 30:

     In the dusky streets around me ruled an innocent and open copulation. The entire town mated together, in the leafy bowers that had sprung up among the washing-machines and television sets in the shopping mall, on the settees and divans by the furniture store, in the tropical paradises of the suburban gardens.

• See also Thesaurus:copulation