Micturate

Micturate (pronounced mik-chuh-reyt)

(1) The desire to urinate (classical meaning).

(2) The act of passing urine; urination (modern use).

1835–1845: From the Latin micturīre (to have the urge to urinate), from mictūrus, from meiō (urinate), from the primitive Indo-European hemeygh (to urinate), the construct being mict(us), the past participle of mingere (to urinate) + -ur- (the desiderative suffix) + -ī- (inserted as a thematic vowel) + -re (the infinitive ending) + -ate (a word-forming element used in forming nouns from Latin words ending in -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as estate, primate & senate).  Those that came to English via French often began with -at, but an -e was added in the fifteenth century or later to indicate the long vowel.  It can also mark adjectives formed from Latin perfect passive participle suffixes of first conjugation verbs -ātus, -āta, & -ātum (such as desolate, moderate & separate).  Again, often they were adopted in Middle English with an –at suffix, the -e appended after circa 1400; a doublet of –ee).  Micturate is a verb, micturitional & micturient are adjectives, micturition is a noun and the derived intermicturition (being between acts of urination).

In Latin, micturate originally meant “a desire to urinate” but it’s now more often used to mean “the act of urination”, the medical profession seeming to like it, presumably because the somewhat obscure “micturate” and “micturition” better demonstrate superior learning than the well-known “urinate” and “urination”.  That’s probably true and at the other end of linguistic respectability there are other alternatives.  Rightly fearing the worst for his own case during the Nuremberg Trial (1945-1946), Hermann Göring (1893–1946; leading Nazi 1922-1945, Reichsmarschall of Germany, 1940-1945) decried an attempt by another defendant to offer arguments in mitigation by saying it was dishonorable “…just to want to piss out the front and shit out the back for a while longer”.

However, though Modern English borrowed micturate from Latin in the mid nineteenth century, the root of the word existed in Old English as (from which the Early Middle English gained miȝen), which then meant “to urinate” (both the Old and Middle English forms appearing in folk-tales recording how lakes and rivers came about from arose from the micturition of a giant or fairy.  So there’s a long history of parallel meanings (to want to go & to go) but urination seems to cover the latter well enough that no synonym seems necessary (and the reichsmarschall’s lead is there to follow if something earthier is needed) so if would be useful if English reserved micturate for the former.  Surely that distinction would be handy especially for the doctors?

Vertical integration: Lindsay Lohan demonstrates the possibility of combining micuration, urination and the assuaging of esurience, Mean Girls (2004).