Well, I'm with you Asa. My preoccupation with the female anatomy hasn't included an analysis of their urinary habits. I did a little research as soon as I saw this post yesterday. I started a reply, but managed to lose it before I posted.
The OED Online offers this definition of
retromingent:
"That urinates backwards. Also as n., an animal which does this."
It's followed by the quotes Kalleh gave. The given etymology is the prefix,
retro-, "backwards" or "back," + the adjective,
mingent, characterized by the discharge of urine.
The term is primarily a zoological one and applies to animals which direct their urine rearward, such as camels, cats, and raccoons. I'm sure there are more. The word is included in this list of zoological terms from
The On-line Medical Dictionary.
The History of Animals written by Aristotle in 350 B.C.E, and translated by D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson is online in nine books. Let me quote from
Book II, Part 1.
quote:
Again, with regard to the breasts and the generative organs, animals differ widely from one another and from man. For instance, the breasts of some animals are situated in front, either in the chest or near to it, and there are in such cases two breasts and two teats, as is the case with man and the elephant, as previously stated. For the elephant has two breasts in the region of the axillae; and the female elephant has two breasts insignificant in size and in no way proportionate to the bulk of the entire frame, in fact, so insignificant as to be invisible in a sideways view; the males also have breasts, like the females, exceedingly small. The she-bear has four breasts. Some animals have two breasts, but situated near the thighs, and teats, likewise two in number, as the sheep; others have four teats, as the cow. Some have breasts neither in the chest nor at the thighs, but in the belly, as the dog and pig; and they have a considerable number of breasts or dugs, but not all of equal size. Thus the shepard has four dugs in the belly, the lioness two, and others more. The she-camel, also, has two dugs and four teats, like the cow. Of solid-hooved animals the males have no dugs, excepting in the case of males that take after the mother, which phenomenon is observable in horses.
Of male animals the genitals of some are external, as is the case with man, the horse, and most other creatures; some are internal, as with the dolphin. With those that have the organ externally placed, the organ in some cases is situated in front, as in the cases already mentioned, and of these some have the organ detached, both penis and testicles, as man; others have penis and testicles closely attached to the belly, some more closely, some less; for this organ is not detached in the wild boar nor in the horse.
The penis of the elephant resembles that of the horse; compared with the size of the animal it is disproportionately small; the testicles are not visible, but are concealed inside in the vicinity of the kidneys; and for this reason the male speedily gives over in the act of intercourse. The genitals of the female are situated where the udder is in sheep; when she is in heat, she draws the organ back and exposes it externally, to facilitate the act of intercourse for the male; and the organ opens out to a considerable extent.
With most animals the genitals have the position above assigned; but some animals discharge their urine backwards, as the lynx, the lion, the camel, and the hare. Male animals differ from one another, as has been said, in this particular, but all female animals are retromingent: even the female elephant like other animals, though she has the privy part below the thighs.
In the male organ itself there is a great diversity. For in some cases the organ is composed of flesh and gristle, as in man; in such cases, the fleshy part does not become inflated, but the gristly part is subject to enlargement. In other cases, the organ is composed of fibrous tissue, as with the camel and the deer; in other cases it is bony, as with the fox, the wolf, the marten, and the weasel; for this organ in the weasel has a bone.
When man has arrived at maturity, his upper part is smaller than the lower one, but with all other blooded animals the reverse holds good. By the 'upper' part we mean all extending from the head down to the parts used for excretion of residuum, and by the 'lower' part else. With animals that have feet the hind legs are to be rated as the lower part in our comparison of magnitudes, and with animals devoid of feet, the tail, and the like.
The first sentence says "animals differ widely from one another and from man," showing that he does not include man (
Homo sapiens, male and female) with animals (though, of course, they are animals), so when he says "but all female animals are retromingent," he is not talking about the human female.
Now, Aristotle lived a long time ago. He believed a lot of things that have proven to not be true, and I certainly can't vouch for the things he said in this book. But it is interesting reading, to me at least.
Note the delicate way he refers to "the privy part below the thighs," and "the parts used for excretion of residuum."
One of the OED quotes says "Retromingents, in natural history, a class or division of animals, whose characteristic is, that they stale..backwards." One meaning of the verb
stale is to urinate, expecially used with domestic animals. As a noun it means urine.
Retromingent refers to principally to animals, that seems clear by the quotes in the OED Online. Let me discuss two of the quotes.
"He is a retromingent animal, and consequently retrogenerative" is from a 1747 issue of
Gentl. Mag. (which, I assume, stands for
Gentlemen's Magazine). I looked up
retrogenerative and found it means
retrocopulant, "Copulating backward, or from behind" (
Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary) In other words, "
doggie style."
"The patient is usually retromingent" is an 1874 in quote by
A practical treatise on the surgical diseases of the genito-urinary organs, by William H. Van Buren and Edward L Keyes. That one does seem to apply to people. I'm not sure what it means.
The OED Online gives the literal meaning of
retromingent, but no figurative meanings. The quote that Shufitz posted at the beginning is obviously figurative, and I have seen the word used elsewhere (online) in a figurative sense. I think
retromingent in this sense is an insult meaning "retrogressive," "backward," or "like an animal."
Tinman
Or, women might try the My Sweet Pee, the Papillon, or the Magic Cone. I was surprised to see so many of these devices posted online because I have never seen them in real life. I am sure there are lots more.
