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# The Meaning of “Heterosexual” in Dorland’s Medical Dictionary of the Early 20th Century
- URL: https://theparnassian.com/en/meditsinskii-slovar-dorlanda-1901-goda-opredeliaet-geteroseksualnost-kak-nenormalnyi-ili-izvrashchennyi-appetit-k-protivopolozhnomu-polu-po-umolchaniiu-no-takzhe-i-k-sobstvennomu-polu/
- Published: 2017-09-18T14:06:35.000Z
- Updated: 2026-10-02T18:56:36.000Z
- Author: Alexandr Radayev
- Tags: Archive, Science, Mores, Society

Dorland's Medical Dictionary of 1901 defines heterosexuality as an "abnormal or perverted appetite" towards the opposite sex /by default/, but also towards one's own sex.

That is to say, at the beginning of the twentieth century, according to Dorland, relationships involving "perverted" sexual appetites, including same-sex attraction, would have been called heterosexual.

"Hetero" means "different", and in the broad sense the term can denote sexual preferences that somehow differ from the accepted norm. These include excessively passionate or intense ones.