Phrase guide

primal scene

noun · 1 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

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1

noun

Meaning 1

In Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) his or her parents copulating.

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

Topics: human-sciences, medicine, psychoanalysis, psychology, sciences

Examples

  • 1983, William J. Kerrigan, The Sacred Complex: On the Psychogenesis of Paradise Lost, Harvard University Press, →ISBN, page 164, The primal scene is the site at which the issues of ego differentiation become translated into the issues of the oedipus complex.
  • 1989, Andrew Samuels, The Plural Psyche:: Personality, Morality, and the Father, Routledge, →ISBN, page 123, The father's presence and image, together with those of the mother, form the raw material of the primal scene.
  • 1995, Joel Whitebook, Perversion and Utopia: a study in psychoanalysis and critical theory, MIT Press, →ISBN, page 51, She argues that perverse sexual activity constitutes an attempt to restage the primal scene in such a way as to eliminate its traumatic aspects.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

Calque of German Urszene. Coined by Sigmund Freud in 1914.

Across languages

Translations

8 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Danish: primalscene — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Finnish: kantanäky — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • German: Urszene — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Norwegian: primalscene — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Russian: перви́чный грех (pervíčnyj grex) — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Swedish: primalscene — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Turkish: birincil sahne — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating
  • Turkish: primer sahne — in Freudian theory, the first time a child witnesses (and understands) its parents copulating