copulation
Americannoun
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sexual intercourse.
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a joining together or coupling.
Etymology
Origin of copulation
1350–1400; Middle English copulacion < Latin cōpulātiōn- (stem of copulātio ) a binding together. See copulate, -ion
Explanation
Copulation is a word for sex — a more scientific way of saying "sexual intercourse." You can use this word to describe the sexual practices of both humans and animals. Zoologists need to make sure there is copulation among endangered animals such as pandas. Stray animals like cats engage in a lot of copulation, which is why there are so many cats. If your female dog is not fixed and copulates at the park, you might have puppies on the way soon.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Female black widow spiders eat males following copulation.
From Textbooks • Jun. 9, 2022
This "forced extra-pair copulation," as it's known, is a fairly rare strategy across birds as a whole.
From Salon • Jul. 25, 2021
“Witnessing white pointer copulation is informally referred to among scholars as the ‘holy grail’ of white shark ecology,” Crawford, a marine biologist from the University of Guelph in Canada, told the Guardian.
From The Guardian • Sep. 4, 2020
The difficulty of securing enough calories to fabricate an ootheca may help explain why females of some mantid species famously engage in sexual cannibalism — consuming their mates after, or even during, copulation.
From New York Times • Sep. 22, 2017
In the laboratory, male gypsy moths have attempted copulation with chips of wood, vermiculite, and other small, inanimate objects, so long as they were suitably impregnated with gyplure.
From "Silent Spring" by Rachel Carson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
