post coitumadv.n.

Etymology: Short for post-classical Latin post coitum omne animal triste est (and variants): ‘after sexual intercourse every animal is sad’ (16th-cent. or earlier, perhaps originally in paraphrases of or commentaries on the pseudo-Aristotelian Problems). Compare pseudo-Aristotle Problems 955 a 22 καὶ μετὰ τὰ ἀϕροδίσια οἱ πλεῖστοι ἀθυμότεροι γίνοται ‘and after love-making most people become rather lacking in spirit’, rendered in a 1475Latin translation as post coitum quoque venereum animo plerique omnes succumbunt, reddunturque tristiores. Compare Problemata Aristotelis ac philosophorum medicorum complurium (1579) 129 (in a section of problems ‘ex variis’, i.e. not from Aristotle) quare animal post coitum tristatur? respondetur, quia actus luxuriae est in se turpis et immundus, ‘why is an animal sad after sexual intercourse? The answer is, that an act of luxury is in itself foul and disgusting’. Compare also Pliny Nat. Hist. 10. 83 homini tantum primi coitus paenitentia ‘man alone experiences regret after first having intercourse’; pseudo-Aristotle Problems 877 b 9 διὰ τί οἱ νέοι, ὅταν πρῶτον ἀϕροδισιάζειν ἄρχωνται, αἷς ἄν ὁμιλήσωσι, μετὰ τὴν πρᾶξιν μισοῦσιν ‘Why do young men, on first having sexual intercourse, afterwards hate those with whom they have just been associated?’Compare the following examples of the Latin phrase in an English context:1602 H. Howard Lett. in Secret Corr. Sir Robert Cecil (1766) (modernized text) 32 The rule of the philosopher, that omne animal post coitum triste.a1632 H. Percy in F. E. Yates Study of Love’s Labour’s Lost (1936) 210 My Mistris..in conclusion produced sadnes, for they say Omne animal post coitum triste.1700 J. Jones Myst. Opium Reveal'd xxxiii. 334 Hence it is, that omne Animal post coitum est triste.1762 L. Sterne Life Tristram Shandy V. xxxvi. 126 The oily and balsamous parts are of a lively heat and spirit, which accounts for the observation of Aristotle, ‘Quod omne animal post coitum est triste’.c1854 W. Gollmann Homoepathic Guide 34 This sexual orgasm is frequently succeeded by languor, drowiness, sadness, irritable mood; hence the proverb: ‘omne animal post coïtum triste,’ after coït every animal feels out of humor.1933 M. Lowry Ultramarine iii. 158 Whether life was worth living or not was a matter for an embryo rather than a man. ‘Post coitum omne animalia triste est. Omne? Supinus pertundo tunicam.’1966 C. M. Bowra Memories 1898–1939 xi. 246 Once Clark was visiting a college farm, and the party witnessed a bull servicing a cow. Clark..said, ‘Blakeway, omne animal post coitum triste. There was, Blakeway, a firm of solicitors in London called Mann, Rogers, and Greaves.’1991 A. Farrow Early Beckett 99 It was the medical writer Galen, trained in stoic philosophy, who gave us the precept omne animal postcoitum triste.