pathic

English

Etymology

From Latin pathicus, from Ancient Greek παθικός (pathikos), from πάθος (pathos, “suffering”, “feeling”), from πάσχω (paskho, “I feel”, “I suffer”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA: /ˈpaθɪk/

Noun

pathic (plural pathics)

1. The passive male partner in anal intercourse.
   • 1810, Lord Byron, letter (to Henry Drury), 3 May 1810:

     In England the vices in fashion are whoring & drinking, in Turkey, Sodomy & smoking, we prefer a girl and a bottle, they a pipe and pathic.

   • 1959: William Burroughs, Naked Lunch

     And enough of these gooey saints with a look of pathic dismay as if they getting fucked up the ass and try not to pay any mind.

   • 1975: Robertson Davies, World of Wonders

     But in those days I was Paul Dempster, who had been made to forget it and take a name from the side of a barn, and be the pathic of a perverted drug-taker.

   • 1976: Robert Nye, Falstaff

     Clermont (known to his friends as Cordelia) was a nancy, a pathic, a male varlet, a masculine whore.

See also

• catamite

Anagrams

• haptic
• phatic