Uranian

Part of speech: adjective

Definitions

1. Pertaining to the heavens or celestial realm ; connected to the planet Uranus in the solar system ; an outdated term for a man who is attracted to other men
2. Associated with the sky or outer space ; describing anything derived from the planet Uranus ; a 19th-century term referring to male homosexuality
3. Concerned with heavenly or celestial matters ; relating to the planet named Uranus ; a historical expression for a homosexual male

Etymology: Long before it named a planet, this word belonged to the Muses. The Greeks called the muse of astronomy Ourania, a name built from "ouranos," meaning sky or heaven, and the adjective "ouranios" meant celestial or heavenly. English took the adjective from that Latin-form name and its celestial sense is the oldest one here. The planet Uranus, discovered in 1781, was named for the Greek sky god, and "Uranian" was later formed from it by adding "-ian" to mean "of or pertaining to the planet." The most surprising turn came from Plato. In his "Symposium," written around 385 to 370 BCE, the goddess Aphrodite in her heavenly aspect, Aphrodite Urania, was described as inspiring a noble affection between older and younger men. In 1864 the German writer Karl Heinrich Ulrichs coined "Urning" from this idea to describe homosexual men, and English adopted "Uranian" in the same sense. By the 1900s, "homosexual" had largely replaced it.