It is a sexual practice where erogenous zones are stimulated with the hand or with some object. It is usually practiced by a person himself. The etymological origin is in the Latin passive verb masturbari, although there is no agreement on how it came to be formed; from the sinful perspective on this practice, it would be the union of manus, us ("hand") and the active verb stuprare ("to desecrate, especially sexually" ), but another version says that it is the union of mas, maris ("masculine") with turbatio, onis ("arousal, disturbance"), because it was supposed to be practiced only by males.
