Definition of "epicœne"

Onely one Iſland they have, is call'd the Iſle of the Epecœnes, becauſe there under one Article both kindes are ſignified, for they are faſhioned alike, male and female the ſame, [...] you doe not know the delight of the Epicœnes in Moon-ſhine.

1620 January 17 (first performance; Gregorian calendar), Benjamin Jonson [i.e., Ben Jonson], “Newes from the New World Discover’d in the Moon. A Masque, […]”, in The Workes of Benjamin Jonson. The Second Volume. […] (Second Folio), London: […] Richard Meighen, published 1640–1641, page 44

Which ſort of Words the Grammarians call Epicœnes (ἐπίκοινος from κοινός common), becauſe they under one Gender, which they commonly take from the Termination, comprehend both Kinds; [...] [Marcus Terentius] Varro, after the example of Ennius and [Quinus] Fabius Pictor, has uſed ſome of theſe Epicœnes in both Genders, e.g. uſing the maſculin lupus (a wolf) as feminin.

1712, Michael Maittaire [i.e., Michel Maittaire], “The Heterology of Words”, in The English Grammar: Or, An Essay on the Art of Grammar, Applied to and Exemplified in the English Tongue, London: Printed for W[illiam] B[owyer] for H. Clements […], page 129

[W]hat ſhall be urged in defence of any male creature, who not only adopts every effeminate foible, but glories in them; and affects to deſpiſe and ridicule the rough unpoliſhed creature, who has ſenſe and ſpirit enough to perſiſt in the manly port of his forefathers? Should it be aſked by any villager, who had never been out of the hundred where he was born, (and none but ſuch aſk the queſtion,) if we really have ſuch Epicœnes amongſt us?

1748 June, “Remembrancer, June 11. Epicurism Ruinous to the State.”, in The Scots Magazine. […], volume X, Edinburgh: Printed by W. Sands, A. Murray, and J. Cochran, page 286

Again, the division of the higher forms of animal life into males and females—obnoxious as it is to the champions of the Woman's Rights Movement, and inconvenient as it proves to a certain class of world-betterers—can neither be abrogated nor explained away. There is, to be sure, a time in the life of hen pheasants, and other female gallinaceous birds, when they—in the magniloquent language of a weekly literary organ of epicœnes and garotters—"rise up and look their tyrant in the face," in the hope that, "ever after, he will sit uneasily on his" roost.

1875 January, “IV. The Boundary between Man and the Lower Animals.”, in William Crookes, editor, The Quarterly Journal of Science, and Annals of Mining, Metallurgy, Engineering, Industrial Arts, Manufactures, and Technology, volume V (New Series; volume XII (Old Series)), London: Offices of the Quarterly Journal of Science, […], page 64