Hickey - Wikipedia

Jump to content

Contents

move to sidebar hide

• (Top)
• 1 History
• 2 Referencese
• 3 External links

• Article
• Talk

English

• Read
• Edit
• View history

Tools Tools move to sidebar hide Actions

• Read
• Edit
• View history

General

• What links here
• Related changes
• Upload file
• Permanent link
• Page information
• Cite this page
• Get shortened URL
• Download QR code

Print/export

• Download as PDF
• Printable version

In other projects

• Wikimedia Commons
• Wikidata item

Appearance move to sidebar hide From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Mark on the skin made by sucking or biting For other uses, see Hickey (disambiguation). "Love bite" redirects here. For the film, see Love Bite. Not to be confused with Kissing contusion, a type of knee injury. Medical condition

Hickey
Other names	Kiss mark, love bite, bug bite, love mark
Hickeys on the neck
Pronunciation	/ˈhɪki/ HIK-ee
Specialty	Dermatology
Duration	3–14 days
Causes	suction on skin

A hickey, often referred to as a love bite in British English and specialised use, is a bruise or bruise-like mark caused by biting or sucking the skin of a person, usually on their neck, arm, or earlobe.[citation needed] While biting may be part of giving a hickey, sucking is sufficient to burst small superficial blood vessels under the skin to produce bruising. A hickey is sometimes used to mark someone as being the target of a partner's romantic affection or as belonging to them.

History

[edit]

In a looser definition, the fourth-century Hindu text Kama Sutra contains references to biting with relation to kissing.[1] "Love bite" as a term is first attested in 1749 in John Cleland's Memoirs of a Woman of Pleasure.[2] The later term 'hickey', originally used in American English and still predominantly in that dialect, is of unclear etymology.[3] Some sources suggests that it derives from the earlier meaning of "pimple, skin lesion" (c. 1915), itself perhaps a sense extension of "small gadget, device; any unspecified object" (1909).[4]

Referencese

[edit]

1. ^ Vatsyayana (1883). "Part II, Chapter V: On Biting". Kama Sutra. Translated by Burton, Richard Francis. p. 46. Archived from the original on 2025-07-02. Retrieved 2025-07-02.
2. ^ "love bite". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/OED/38907269100. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
3. ^ "hickey". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
4. ^ Harper, Douglas. "hickie". Online Etymology Dictionary. Retrieved 2025-07-02.

External links

[edit]

Classification	D ICD-10: Xxx.x ICD-9-CM: xxx

This cutaneous condition article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by adding missing information.

• v
• t
• e

Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Hickey&oldid=1337250986" Categories:

• Injuries
• Injuries of neck
• Sexual acts
• Cutaneous condition stubs

Hidden categories:

• Articles with short description
• Short description is different from Wikidata
• All articles with unsourced statements
• Articles with unsourced statements from December 2024
• All stub articles

Search Search Toggle the table of contents Hickey 31 languages Add topic