Definitions

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

  • noun A public urinal, especially one located on a street.

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

  • noun a public urinal, in European countries.

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

  • noun A public urinal typically found in European, especially French, streets.

Etymologies

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

[French, from Old French, from pissier, to urinate; see piss.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

First attested in 1919. From French pissoir.

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Examples

Comments

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  • "The loo experience has become as important to the people who design restaurants in New York as gleaming open kitchens were in the 80's. No building material is too obscure, no plumbing detail below notice. Not terribly long ago, a conversation pissoir was still a novelty. You had Phillipe Starck's men's room waterfall in the Royalton. You had Bar 89 in SoHo, where the glass doors shift from transparent to opaque -- as long as the user remembers to turn the lock."

    The New York Times, Behind the 'M' And the 'W,' A New Style, by Rick Marin, August 2, 2000

    September 9, 2008