Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun A sexually transmitted disease caused by gonococcal bacteria that affects the mucous membrane chiefly of the genital and urinary tracts and is characterized by an acute purulent discharge and painful or difficult urination, though women often have no symptoms.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun In pathol., a. specific, contagious, muco-purulent inflammation of the male urethra or the female vagina and urethra. It may also be communicated to the conjunctival and rectal mucous membranes.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun (Med.) A contagious inflammatory disease of the genitourinary tract, affecting especially the urethra and vagina, and characterized by a mucopurulent discharge, pain in urination, and chordee; clap.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun An STD caused by a species of bacteria (the gonococcus) that affects the mucous membrane of the genital and urinary tracts.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun a common venereal disease caused by the bacterium Neisseria gonorrhoeae; symptoms are painful urination and pain around the urethra

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Greek gonorrhoia, flow of seed (from the mistaken belief that the discharge contained semen) : gono-, gono- + -rhoia, -rrhea.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From New Latin, from Late Latin gonorrhoia, from Ancient Greek γονόρροια (gonorroia), from γόνος (gonos, "sperm. seed, offspring") + ῥέω (rheō, "I flow") (ca. 1526).

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word gonorrhea.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • Ah! Too late for regrets. I'm a gonner 'ere!

    January 29, 2008

  • "Morning dew".

    May 7, 2008

  • The name of one of the ugly elder sisters in ''King Lear''. Also, an excellent name for a dog, as when you take it for a run in the park and it disappears, you can bellow "Gono -- rrheeee -- ah!" (lovely clear vowels) and be reasonably certain that there won't be lots of other dogs with the same name bounding up, which would not be the case had you named your mutt Fido. See chlamydia.

    December 29, 2008

  • Goneril was a gomeril.

    December 29, 2008